BR  121  .B73 
Brown,  William  Bryant 
Th©  Gospel  of  the  Kingdom 
and  the  Gospel  of  the 


The  Gospel  of  the  Kingdom 

and 

The  Gospel  of  the  Church 


BY  THE  SAME  AUTHOR 

Light 
;?i.50. 

of 

The  Problem  of  Final  Destiny  in  the 

Revised  Theological   Statement 
l2mo,  cloth Price 

THOMAS  WHITTAKER 

Publisher 

2  AND  3  Bible  House,  New  York 

The  Gospel  of  the  Kingdom 

and 

The  Gospel  of  the  Church 


By  WILLIAM  B.  BROWN,  D.D. 

Author  of  "The  Problem  of  Final  Destiny,"'  Etc, 


"And  Jesus  went  about  all  Galilee  teaching  in  their  synagogues 
and  preaching  the  Gospel  of  the  Kingdom." 


NEW  YORK 
THOMAS  WHITTAKER 

2  AND  3  BIBLE  HOUSE 
1903 


Copyright,  1902, 
By  WILLIAM  B.  BROWN 


THE  CAXTON  PRESS 
NEW  YORK. 


Dedicatory 

This  studeouslj  small  volume  is  affectionately 
dedicated  to  the  author's  many  friends,  living  and 
dead,  who  may,  at  any  period  of  the  last  sixty 
years,  have  been  associated  with  him  in  his  public 
ministry.  One  practical  purpose  of  the  book  apart 
from  its  presentation  of  the  Gospel  of  the  Kingdom 
as  related  to  that  of  the  Church  is  to  enlarge  the 
ideal  of  religion,  so  that  it  shall  include,  not  a  part 
only,  but  the  whole  of  human  activity  and  life. 
That  the  work  was  written  in  the  eighty-sixth 
year  of  the  author's  earthly  life  affords  natural 
ground  for  self-distrust;  but  of  itself,  is  not  a 
sufficient  reason  for  or  against  its  publication.  If 
the  subject  treated  be  not  interesting,  important 
and  timely,  and  one  that  calls  for  careful  exposi- 
tion ;  and  if  the  style  of  the  book  is  not  clear,  con- 
cise, consecutive,  constructive  and  convincing,  but 
without  ornamentation  simply  for  ornamentation's 
sake, — then  friends  may  look  upon  it  with  sympa- 
thetic sadness,  and  the  general  public  with  cold 
indifference.  The  work  has  this  in  its  commenda- 
tion :  It  is  not  an  old  man's  conservatism,  nor  a 
reminiscence  of  the  past,  but  an  inspiring  vision  of 
the  future, — of  the  whole  world  after  a  long  and 
eventful  struggle  with  environment,  finally  at  rest 
in  the  Gospel  of  the  Kingdom. 


Contents 


CHAP.  Pi-GM 

i^   I.    OuE  Lord's  Preaching  of  thb  Gospel  of  the 

Kingdom 9 

'*'    II.    The  Substitution  of  the  Gospel  of  the  Church 

FOR  THAT  OF  THE  KINGDOM       27 

III.  The  Good  and  the  Evil  that  Have  Resulted 

FROM  that  Substitution 43 

IV.  The  Gospel  of  the  Kingdom  to  Become  Uni- 

versal         61 

V.    Evolution  God's  Law  of  Progress  and  Man's 

Advance  into  the  Kingdom 81 

VI.    The     Twentieth     Century    Crisis    and    the 

Kingdom 97 

VII.    A  True  Knowledge  of  God  the  Open  Doorway 

into  the  Kingdom 117 

VIII.    Eeligious  and  Church  Agencies  that  Lead  into 

the  Kingdom 135 

IX.    Agencies  for  the  Kingdom  that  Lie  Outside  of 

THE  Church 155 

X.    All  the  Religions  of  the  World  to  be  Unified 
AND    Harmonized    in    the   Gospel   of   the 

Kingdom 175 

^     XI.    The  Gospel  of  the  Kingdom  on  Earth  as  it  is 

IN  Heaven ••   ...    193 

XII.  Summary  and  Conclusion  ,  ,  .  , 211 


I. 

OUK  LOED'S  PEEACHmO  OF  THE  GOSPEL 
OF  THE  KmGDOM. 


OUR  lord's  preaching  of  the  gospel  of  the 

KINGDOM. 

The  conception  of  a  kingdom,  at  first  imperfectly 
apprehended,  in  which  God  is  supreme  and  man  is 
subject,  is  as  old  as  the  human  race.  Religion  it- 
self, which  is  inherent  in  human  nature,  presupposes 
such  a  kingdom.  The  fragments  of  ancient  annals 
discovered  in  the  last  half  century,  reveal  that  peo- 
ples centuries  older  than  Moses  or  Abraham  not 
only  had  their  religions  and  their  deities,  but  they 
recognized  the  fact  of  a  Theocratic  government. 

No  thoughtful  reader  of  the  first  chapters  of 
Genesis  can  fail  to  see  that,  in  the  garden,  at  the 
opening  of  human  history,  the  idea  of  God  as  King 
and  of  man  as  subject  was  clearly  recognized. 
Indeed,  this  is  the  central  truth  brought  distinctly 
into  view  in  those  chapters.  All  through  the  pa- 
triarchal history  this  conception  of  a  kingdom,  and 
of  God  as  King,  was,  by  promises  and  threatenings, 
by  rewards  and  penalties,  so  forced  upon  the  atten- 
tion of  men  that  its  reality  and  importance  could 

not  be  misapprehended. 

11 


12  TEE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGD03L 

Not  the  Old  Testament  alone,  but  in  those  early 
classic  writers  from  Egypt,  Babylon,  Greece  and 
other  lands,  not  less  than  among  the  Hebrews,  the 
gods  were  recognized  as  kings  and  rulers  of  men, 
whose  favor  and  protection  they  sought  and  to 
whom  they  professed  allegiance.  But  so  far  as  we 
know,  Moses  was  the  first  to  reduce  this  universal 
conception  of  a  theocratic  kingdom  into  definite 
written  form.  The  whole  Mosaic  s^^stem  was  that 
of  a  Theocracy,  in  which  God  was  supreme.  "When, 
centuries  later,  the  people,  ambitious  to  become 
like  the  other  nations,  desired  a  king  from  among 
themselves  they  were  warned  of  danger,  and 
accused  of  wishing  to  substitute  for  the  Theocracy  a 
form  of  government  not  in  accord  with  the  king- 
dom of  God.  While  they  denied  this  they  elected 
and  crowned  Saul  as  king.  Then  their  misfortunes 
began ;  and  after  many  centuries  of  checkered  his- 
tory came  the  Babylonish  captivit}^. 

All  the  prophets  from  the  beginning  and  more 
and  more  as  the  centuries  passed  on,  recognized  the 
kingdom,  and  God  as  King.  Daniel,  one  of  the 
latest  of  the  Old  Testament  writers,  foretold  the 
coming  Messiah  who  should  set  up  a  kingdom  and 
whose  dominion  should  be  an  everlasting  dominion. 
This  was  the  same  kingdom  that  had  always  been 


OUB  LORD'S  PBE ACHING  OF  THE  KINGD03L        13 

recognized,  except  that  God  was  now  to  be  perso- 
nated in  human  form.  When  John  the  baptizer 
appeared  on  the  outskirts  of  the  wilderness  and 
began  to  deliver  his  great  message,  his  first  words 
were  a  quotation  from  Isaiah, — the  greatest  of  the 
prophets,--"  Prepare  ye  the  way  of  the  Lord  for 
the  kingdom  of  heaven  is  at  hand."  And  our 
Lord's  first  deliverance  was  in  the  same  strain. 
The  time  He  said  is  fulfilled  and  the  kingdom  of 
heaven  is  at  hand.  He  went  throughout  Galilee 
preaching  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom. 
,  The  gospel  of  the  kingdom  was  ever  the  central 
theme  of  our  Lord's  preaching,  and  must  therefore 
be  the  central  theme  of  Christianity,  the  focal  point 
towards  which  all  things  converge.  Sometimes 
Jesus  spoke  of  the  kingdom  of  God,  at  others  of 
the  kingdom  of  heaven,  and  often  simply  of  the 
kingdom,  without  qualification ;  but  everywhere 
and  continually  the  kingdom  was  His  theme.  No 
word  of  lesser  meaning  could  contain  or  express 
the  vastness  of  His  thought.  About  one  hundred 
times,  mostly  in  the  synoptic  gospels,  Jesus  is  re- 
ported to  have  spoken  of  the  kingdom  and  to  have 
made  it  the  subject  of  discussion.  Several  times, 
but  in  different  connections,  He  compares  the  king- 
dom to  the  sowing  and  growth  of  seeds ;  then  it  is 


14  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

like  a  womaa  putting  leaven  in  her  meal,  until  all 
was  leavened ;  then  again,  it  was  like  a  grain  of 
mustard  seed,  the  smallest  of  seeds  which  grew  to 
be  a  tree  on  whose  branches  the  birds  of  the  air 
could  rest,  l^ow  it  is  like  a  woman  searching  for 
lost  pieces  of  money ;  and  then  it  is  like  a  shepherd 
seeking  and  finding  his  lost  sheep  and  rejoicing 
over  it.  These  are  only  specimens  of  the  many 
similitudes  Jesus  employed  in  setting  forth  the 
nature  and  work  of  the  kingdom.  The  kingdom, 
Jesus  said  to  the  Pharisees,  is  within  you,  meaning 
evidently  that  the  human  mind  is  so  configured  to 
the  Almighty  that  it  needs,  and  is  susceptible  of, 
those  qualities  of  heart  and  life  that  the  kingdom 
provides  for  and  enjoins. 

In  many  places  where  the  word  kingdom  is  not 
spoken,  our  Lord's  discourses  have  evident  reference 
to  it.  The  whole  Sermon  on  the  Mount  is  an  ex- 
position of  the  principles  of  the  kingdom.  "What 
He  says  of  Himself  as  being  the  vine  and  His  dis- 
ciples the  branches  ;  of  His  being  the  shepherd  and 
His  people  the  sheep ;  of  His  being  the  door,  the 
way,  the  truth  and  the  life,  are  all  expositions  of 
the  kingdom.  Our  Lord's  tender  discourse  and 
prayer  with  His  disciples  extending  from  the  14th 
to  the  end  of  the  lYth  of  John,  is  a  revelation  of 


OUR  LORD'S  PREACHING  OF  THE  ETNGD03I.        15 

the  spirit  of  the  kingdom.  In  a  word,  Christ  and 
the  gospel  of  the  kingdom  is  the  theme  of  the  four 
gospels. 

N^ot  only  is  the  kingdom  coeval  and  coextensive 
with  the  human  race,  and  the  central  theme  of  the 
gospels,  as  we  have  seen,  but  it  is  vastly  more.  Its 
field  is  the  universe,  and  its  principles  and  their 
operation  are  as  infinite  and  absolute  as  is  God 
Himself.  ]S"ot  that  the  principles  and  workings  of 
the  kingdom  are  so  absolute  as  to  set  aside  the 
freedom  of  moral  beings ;  for  it  makes  responsible 
beings  responsible,  and  places  God  over  all  and 
King  forever. 

Turning  now  from  this  more  general  view  of  the 
subject  the  question  to  be  considered  is :  What  did 
our  Lord  mean  by  the  kingdom  as  He,  in  part,  un- 
folded it  to  the  people  of  His  day,  and  as  the 
principles  He  taught  involve  and  unfold  it  to  all 
subsequent  ages  ? 

It  is  a  law  of  revelation  that  the  sacred  writers 
speak  to  the  people  of  their  own  times.  As  a  rule 
they  do  not  speak  exhaustively  or  ideally  upon  the 
subjects  treated,  but  unfold  them  only  so  far  as 
those  whom  they  address  are  able  to  comprehend 
and  accept.  Hence  the  Bible  cannot  be  in  all  parts 
ideally  inerrant.     If  there  be  any  exception  to  this 


16  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

rule,  it  is  to  be  found  in  the  person  and  teachings  of 
Jesus  Christ.  And  yet  even  here  Christ  left  many 
things  in  a  state  of  incompleteness  and  uncertainty. 
Many  of  the  live  questions  of  to-day  He  never 
.  touched  upon  if,  indeed.  He  ever  thought  of  them. 
Jesus  taught  great  principles  as  no  one  else  has 
ever  thought  them;  and  principles  that  were  not 
comprehended  in  His  own  times  except  in  small 
part,  and  whose  meaning  and  application  have  been 
unfolding  ever  since,  and  will  continue  to  unfold 
while  time  endures. 

We  may  not  then  expect  to  find  the  doctrine  of 
the  kingdom  mapped  out  in  full  detail  in  the  gos- 
pels, but  the  seed  principles  are  there,  and  it  is  for 
those  who  come  after  Jesus  to  study  and  apply  the 
principles  He  taught,  thus  broadening,  enlarging 
and  clarifying,  from  one  generation  to  another,  the 
world's  knowledge  of  the  kingdom. 

First,  then,  we  must  not  take  our  understanding 
A  of  the  kingdom  from  the  view  of  it  that  was  held 
'  by  the  people  of  Christ's  own  day.  When  Jesus 
came  to  the  Jews  they  understood  neither  Him  nor 
His  teachings.  He  was  regarded  by  the  leaders  as 
either  an  impostor  or  a  madman.  Some  of  the 
common  people  followed  Him  in  the  spirit  of  idle 
curiosity,  some  on  account  of  the  wonders  He  per- 


OUR  LORD'S  PREACHING  OF  THE  KINGDOM,        17 

formed,  and  others  because  they  thought  Him  a 
prophet  sent  from  God  whose  words  to  them  were 
mysteries.  He  was  a  mystery  to  His  own  family 
who  thought  Him  a  victim  of  some  strange  halluci- 
nation. Even  John  in  prison  was  brought  into 
doubt,  and  His  very  apostles  while  He  lived,  did 
not  understand  Him ;  and  at  His  betrayal  they  for- 
sook Him  and  fled.  Clearly  then  we  cannot  take 
our  conceptions  of  the  kingdom  from  what  the  men 
of  Christ's  day  thought  of  it.  They  were  incom- 
petent to  judge. 

Again,  the  term  religion,  not  of  Scripture  origin, 
and  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom,  are  not  synonymous. 
The  two  terms  have  much  in  common,  but  that  of 
religion  includes  an  amount  of  form,  ceremony, 
perfunctory  service,  superstition  and  other  such 
things  with  which  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom  has 
nothing  to  do.  This  gospel  cares  little  for  mere 
outward  service,  and  everything  for  light,  love  and 
life  as  the  ruling  principles  of  the  minds  and  hearts 
of  men.  A  cold  sense  of  duty  and  a  purpose  to 
perform  it  is  better  than  nothing,  but,  apart  from 
love,  it  is  a  legal,  slavish  service  that  falls  far  below 
the  gospel  ideal  as  Jesus  saw  it  and  as  it  was  ex- 
pounded by  Paul.  Much  of  what  is  called  religion 
may  be  delusion,  deception  or  even  a  sham ;  but, 


18  TEE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

being  in  the  kingdom  is  to  serve  God  and  man  from 
love,  and  this  is  a  joyous,  unselfish,  restful  service. 
It  is  a  life  of  Christlikeness  and  so  brings  freedom, 
peace  and  gladness  to  all  who  enter  it ;  while  much 
that  is  called  religion  is  only  fear  and  bondage. 

The  kingdom  that  Jesus  taught  and  came  to  es- 
tablish was  no  outward,  visible  organization,  civil 
or  ecclesiastical,  that  could  be  seen,  framed  and 
operated  by  men.  He  said  distinctly  to  Pilate, — I 
am  a  king, — but  immediately  added, — My  kingdom 
is  not  of  this  world.  He  did  not  mean  that  His 
kingdom  was  wholly  out  of  this  world  and  in  some 
other  world,  but  that  it  was  Vholly  different  in 
character  and  aim  from  other  kingdoms  and  human 
organizations  that  then  existed.  He  did  not  mean 
to  depreciate  the  value  of  earthly  kingdoms,  but  to 
differentiate  His  own  from  them  all. 
^\.  Jesus  came  to  preach  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom, 
but  not  to  bring  it  within  the  range  or  limits  of 
any  visible,  tangible  organization.  His  preaching 
was  progressive  in  thought  and  form,  as  a  compar- 
ison of  His  earlier  with  His  later  discourses  reveals. 
Compare,  for  example,  His  Sermon  on  the  Mount 
with  His  last  consolatory  address  and  we  see 
progress  as  to  detail,  but  no  command  or  even  hint 
of  organization.     When  once  His  disciples  proposed 


OUB  LORD'S  PREACHING  OF  THE  KINGDOM.        19 

to  make  Him  king  in  their  sense  of  the  term,  He 
instantly  rejected  the  suggestion.  He  sent  out  His 
disciples  to  preach  the  kingdom,  but  never  to  or- 
ganize His  work  or  theirs.  His  last  words  to  His 
disciples,  before  He  ascended  were  :  Go  ye  into  all 
the  world  and  preach  the  gospel  to  every  creature ; 
but  He  did  not  say, — Preach  and  organize  the 
gospel  of  the  kingdom.  My  point  is  that  Christ's 
conception  of  the  kingdom  never  included  what  we 
mean  by  visible  organization  for  its  advancement. 
The  only  needful  organization  was  in  Himself  and 
in  the  principles  of  the  kingdom  which  He  incul- 
cated. Christ  is  King  and  Euler  over  all  who  know 
and  love  Him,  and  they  need  no  other.  When  men 
attempt  to  organize  Christ's  kingdom  and  to  put  its 
management  into  human  hands,  the  least  that  can 
be  said  is  that  they  run  without  being  sent. 

The  kingdom  as  Jesus  saw  and  preached  it  was 
mainly  for  this  world  and  not  for  angels  and  re- 
deemed spirits  in  heaven.  The  same  kingdom  is 
already  consummated  in  heaven,  and  Christ  came 
to  establish  it  on  earth  as  it  was  and  is  in  heaven. 
He  taught  us  to  pray.  Thy  kingdom  come  on  earth 
as  it  is  in  heaven.  It  is  true  that  Jesus  brought 
life  and  immortality  to  light,  and  that  He  said  to 
His    disciples, — In  My   Father's   house   are  many 


20  TEE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

mansions  ;  but  all  this,  and  all  that  He  said  about 
heaven,  was  to  lead  men  into  the  kingdom  while 
yet  they  lived  in  this  world.  It  was  for  men  and 
not  for  angels  that  Christ  came  and  preached  the 
good  news  of  the  kingdom,  otherwise  He  would 
have  preached  to  angels  and  not  to  men.  Unless 
we  see  and  accept  this  view,  we  shut  ourselves  and 
the  world  out  from  the  kingdom  and  its  blessedness 
that  Jesus  came  to  establish  on  earth  as  it  is  in 
heaven.  If  we  are  not  in  the  kingdom  while  we 
yet  live  in  the  body  we  shall  not  be  prepared  for  it 
when  we  go  out  of  the  body.  The  kingdom  that 
Jesus  preached  is  for  men  to  enter  while  they  yet 
live  here  on  the  earth. 

^  The  kingdom  that  Jesus  preached  was  not  the 
premillennarian  or  the  sub-resurrection  kingdom 
that  some  think  it  to  have  been.  The  belief  is 
general  that  there  is  to  be  a  period  of  at  least  one 
thousand  years  during  which  Christ  shall  reign 
supreme  over  all  the  world.  One  class  of  Chris- 
tians, not  large,  but  many  of  them  intellectual, 
educated  and  devout  men,  hold  that  Christ  is  to 
come  in  visible  form,  and  in  great  splendor  on  the 
clouds  of  heaven  at  the  opening  of  the  millennial 
period  ;  that  when  He  so  comes  those  who  are  then 
living  will  be  changed,  the  dead  will  be  raised  and 


OUB  LORD'S  PREACHING  OF  THE  KINGDOM.        21 

the  kingdom  of  which  Jesus  spoke  so  constantly 
will  be  set  up  with  Himself  as  the  visibly  en- 
throned King,  probably  on  the  Mount  of  Olives ; 
and  that  this  kingdom  will  endure  for  at  least  one 
thousand  years.  This  view  of  the  kingdom  is  de- 
rived partly  from  the  book  of  Daniel,  partly  from 
what  Jesus  said  in  the  twenty-fourth  of  Matthew 
and  other  kindred  passages,  and  partly  from  the 
apostolic  epistles  including  the  book  of  Eevelation. 
The  Christians  of  the  first  century,  including  the 
apostles,  were  ever  looking  for  the  immediate 
coming  of  their  ascended  Lord,  whom  they  confi- 
dently expected  would  appear  visibly  in  their  day. 
He  was  to  be  seen  in  glory  with  the  holy  angels 
before  that  generation  should  pass  away.  They 
were  mistaken  ;  they  were  disappointed ;  their  ex- 
pectations were  not  fulfilled. 

The  Scriptures  contain  scenic  and  spectacular 
representations  and  prophecies  which,  if  construed 
literally  appear  to  support  that  view.  But  every 
Bible  student  should  know  that  this  whole  class  of 
scenic  prophecies  was  never  intended  to  have  a 
literal,  or  any  other  than  a  spiritual  fulfilment.  To 
put  any  other  construction  on  this  class  of  passages 
is  to  deny  their  truthfulness. 

Jesus  did  come  in  that  generation  as  He  prom- 


22  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM, 

ised,  but  not  in  the  spectacular  sense  which  they 
anticipated.  This  subject  is  treated  at  length  in 
my  book  on  The  Problem  of  Final  Destiny. 
Christ's  kingdom  was  not  outward  to  the  senses 
but  inward  and  spiritual,  in  the  hearts  of  men. 

All  I  care  now  to  emphasize  is  that  the  kingdom 
which  Jesus  preached  was  not  something  that  He 
Himself  was  miraculously  to  set  up  two  or  ten 
thousand  years  in  the  future,  but  was  something 
practical  and  personal  for  the  people  of  His  own 
day  and  of  our  day.  It  was  a  kingdom  into  which 
those  whom  He  then  addressed  were  encouraged, 
by  repentance  and  faith,  then  and  there  to  enter 
and  to  enjoy  its  privileges.  Any  other  view  would, 
to  my  mind,  make  Christ's  teaching  of  the  kingdom 
mystical,  impracticable,  misleading,  and  so  worse 
than  useless.  The  kingdom  that  Jesus  preached 
was  a  present  kingdom  and  not  some  scenic,  mirac- 
ulous manifestation  thousands  of  years  away,  or  it 
was  nothing  of  worth  to  the  people  of  His  own  day 
lor  of  ours. 

Having  settled  some  mistakes  as  to  the  kingdom 
^Twe  come  now  to  a  fuller  study  of  its  nature.  The 
kingdom  that  Jesus  preached  was  a  spiritual  king- 
dom to  be  set  up  in  the  hearts  of  men.  It  was  a 
kingdom   of  righteousness.     It    was  not   outward 


OUB  LORD'S  PRE  AGEING  OF  THE  KINGDOM,        23 

form  but  inward  life  ;  it  was  not  letter  but  spirit ; 
it  was  not  creed  but  experience  ;  it  was  not  profes- 
sion but  reality  ;  not  intellection  but  heart-choice ; 
not  authority  but  reason  ;  not  tradition  but  truth 
in  the  lives  and  souls  of  men.  This  is  what  Jesus 
meant  by  the  kingdom.  ^ 

It  follows  then  that  the  central  virtue,  and  the 
only  essential  thing  in  Christ's  gospel  of  the  king- 
dom is  love,  love  of  God  and  love  of  man.  It  is  a 
love  that  means  good- will  and  unselfishness ;  a  love 
that  expresses  itself  in  accordant  life.  Love  is  of 
God,  for  God  is  love.  He  that  loveth  is  born  of 
God  and  knoweth  God.  Love  is  the  fulfilling  of 
the  law.  It  is  the  central  staple  on  which  all  the 
commandments  hang,  and  from  which  they  derive 
their  character  and  value.  Love,  rightly  expressed, 
is  the  only  law  of  Christ's  kingdom,  and  must 
therefore  be  made  emphatic  in  this  investigation. 

Love  is  not  only  the  central  truth  of  Christianity 
and  of  the  kingdom,  but  it  is  the  central  truth 
throughout  the  moral  universe  of  God.  It  is  in  the 
spiritual  world  what  gravitation  is  in  the  physical ; 
— the  one  principle  that  holds^  all  moral  and  eter- 
nal interests  in  harmony,  that  unifies  them  and 
binds  them  to  God  from  whom  they  all  proceed. 
Without  this  central  principle  of  the  kingdom  noth- 


24  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

ing  of  enduring  value  could  be  secured ;  nothing 
great  would  be  undertaken  and  nothing  good  ac- 
complished. Where  love  reigns  moral  evil,  and 
that  alone,  is  destroyed.     Love  is  of  God,  for 

"  God  is  love  saith  the  Evangel, 
And  the  world  of  woe  and  sin, 
Is  made  light  and  happy  only 
When  a  love  is  shining  in." 

■'-'Christ's  kingdom  then  is  the  kingdom  of  love 
burning  on  the  altar  of  human  hearts  and  shining 
brightly  in  Christian  lives,  and  so  of  necessity, 
moulding  character  and  regulating  conduct.  "When 
all  men,  each  for  himself,  has  this  experience,  then 
will  Christ's  kingdom  be  established  on  earth  as  it 
is  in  heaven.  The  intellect  may  still  be  at  fault, 
but  the  heart  will  be  true  to  Him  who  is  God  over 
all  and  King  forever,  as  the  needle  is  to  the  pole. 

The  kingdom  that  Christ  preached  is,  in  its 
character,  instrumentalities  and  aims,  both  in- 
dividualistic and  socialistic ;  that  is  to  say,  it  ap- 
plies and  appeals  alike  to  individuals  as  such  and  to 
organized  society.  Hitherto,  until  recently.  Chris- 
tian teachers  have  been  mainly  intent  upon  preach- 
ing the  gospel  of  the  kingdom  to  individuals  in 
order  to  secure  individual  conversions  to  Christ  and 
the  upbuilding  of  individual  Christian  character. 


OUB  LORD'S  PREACHING  OF  THE  KINGDOM.        25 

This  point  of  individualism  has  been  urged  too  ex- 
clusively. True,  in  a  sense,  "  every  tub  must  stand 
on  its  own  bottom."  Each  moral  being  has  respon- 
sibilities and  duties  that  he  cannot  delegate  and 
may  not  shirk.  "While  it  is  true  that  every  man 
must  bear  his  own  burdens,  it  is  equally  true  that 
we  are  to  bear  one  another's  burdens.  The  king- 
dom stands  in  the  same  essential  relations  to  orga- 
nized society  that  it  does  to  individuals.  Men  are 
to  be  instructed,  reformed,  elevated,  converted  and 
brought  into  the  kingdom  in  their  associated  capac- 
ity no  less  than  as  individuals.  Families,  commu- 
nities and  nations,  all  organized  bodies  existing  for 
useful  ends  are,  as  bodies,  proper  subjects  for  the 
kingdom ;  and  every  existing  agency  that  tends  in 
any  way,  direct  or  indirect,  to  advance  society  and 
the  world  towards  the  kingdom  is  an  element  of 
that  kingdom.  The  principles  that  Jesus  taught 
carried  to  their  natural  limits,  involve  all  this,  and 
show  that  the  kingdom  is  a  much  larger  thing  than 
has  generally  been  supposed.  It  is  not  only  for  the 
saving  of  individuals  but  for  the  uplifting  of  so- 
ciety, of  organizations,  of  nations  and  of  the  world. 
This  great  subject  is  only  referred  to  here  as  ex- 
planatory of  the  nature  of  Christ's  kingdom,  and 
will  be  considered  more  fully  in  its  proper  connection. 


26  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

We  have  now  before  us  a  general  description  of 
the  gospel  of  the  kingdom,  but  not  a  full  definition. 
Even  if  every  essential  element  of  the  kingdom 
were  included,  this,  of  itself,  does  not  sufficiently 
differentiate  the  kingdom  from  all  that  closely  re- 
sembles it,  but  is  not  identical  with  it,  and  there- 
fore is  not  a  complete  definition.  Not  till  we  have 
studied  the  gospel  of  the  Church,  its  scope,  modes 
of  working,  and  its  relations  to  the  gospel  of  the 
kingdom  can  a  full  definition  of  either  Church  or 
kingdom  be  reached.  The  two  are  alike  while  yet 
they  differ.  Our  second  chapter  is  upon  the  substi- 
tution of  the  Church  for  the  kingdom,  and  this  will 
open  the  way  for  comparison  between  them,  which 
must  result  in  bringing  the  kingdom  more  fully 
into  view  than  any  study  of  it  apart  by  itself,  could 
do.  The  one  conception  I  have  of  the  gospel  of 
the  kingdom,  as  Jesus  saw  it,  is  that  it  relates  to 
and  includes  everything  in  human  history  that 
works  away  from  ignorance  and  selfishness  and  to- 
wards enlightenment,  morality  and  spiritual  life. 
All  such  agencies  and  influences  belong  to  the  gos- 
pel of  the  kingdom.  The  gospel  of  the  Church,  as 
we  shall  see,  means  much  less  than  this.  Its 
thought  and  movement  are  individualistic  and  apart 
from  the  general  field  of  advancing  civilization. 


IL 

THE   SUBSTITUTION  OF  THE  GOSPEL  OF 

THE  CHUKCH  FOR  THAT  OF  THE 

KINGDOM. 


11. 


THE     SUBSTITUTION     OF     THE     GOSPEL     OF      THE 
CHURCH   FOK   THAT    OF   THE   KINGDOM. 

"We  have  seen  that  the  central  theme  of  our 
Lord's  preaching  was  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom ; 
and  also  what  the  kingdom  was  that  Jesus  preached. 
Most  naturally  and  without  hesitation,  we  should 
anticipate  that  the  apostles  and  their  associates 
would  follow  closely  in  their  Master's  steps,  and 
preach  for  substance  what  they  had  heard  from  His 
lips ;  and  that  therefore,  their  great  theme,  as  was 
His,  would  be  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom.  If  the 
apostles  believed,  as  they  did,  that  Jesus  was  a 
prophet  sent  from  God,  that  He  was  the  promised 
Messiah,  that  He  was  God  manifested  in  the  flesh, 
that  He  was  the  world's  Saviour,  and  the  imperson- 
ation of  divine  wisdom  and  goodness, — if  they  be- 
lieved all  this, — then  we  should  say  that  most 
surely  they  would  keep  very  close  to  the  line  of 
their  Lord's  teaching,  especially  as  to  the  gospel  of 
the  kingdom,  which  was  His  central  and  constant 
subject  of  discourse.     We  should  expect  them  to 

present  to  others  what  He  Himself  had  taught. 

29 


30  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM, 

To  put  this  thought  in  a  still  stronger  light,  let 
us  glance  a  moment  at  some  corresponding  cases. 
The  Buddhists  received  their  religious  teachings, 
many  centuries  ago,  from  Buddha  whom  they 
reverenced  as  an  inspired  teacher ;  and  from  that 
day  Buddish  priests  have  been  proclaiming,  as  they 
naturally  should,  the  central  doctrines  that  Buddha 
taught.  Mohammedans,  from  the  first,  have  closely 
adhered  to  the  teachings  of  their  great  prophet. 
The  Lutherans  hold  and  teach  the  central  doctrines 
of  Luther;  and  the  Calvinists,  of  Calvin;  the 
Armenians  adhere  to  their  Dutch  oracle,  Armenius ; 
and  the  Wesleyans,  to  Wesley ;  and  so  on  to  the  end 
of  the  chapter.  All  this  is  perfectly  natural,  and 
an  opposite  course  would  have  been  unnatural  and 
disappointing. 

Applying  the  same  principle  to  the  apostles  and 
their  relation  to  our  Lord's  teaching,  how  much 
more  strongly  should  we  anticipate  that  His  great 
central  theme  of  discourse  would  be  theirs  also, 
and  that  it  would  be  presented  by  them  after  His 
own  way  of  teaching  it.  We  could  not  look  for 
less,  and  yet  our  anticipations  are  not  realized. 
They  do  not  preach  the  kingdom. 

At  this  point  two  singular  facts,  not  easih''  ex- 
plained, have  to  be  met.     The  first  is  that  the  word 


THE  SUBSTITUTION  OF  THE  CUURCH.  31 

kingdom  is  dropped  almost  entirely  from  their 
writings.  Only  about  four  times  in  the  Acts  of  the 
Apostles  and  in  all  the  Epistles, — together  more 
than  twice  the  length  of  the  Synoptic  Gospels, — 
does  the  word  kingdom  appear  ;  and  in  all  but  one 
of  these  instances  it  has  no  reference  to  Christ's 
conception  of  the  kingdom  as  something  to  be  es- 
tablished on  earth,  but  exclusively  to  the  soul's  con- 
dition in  heaven  after  the  earthly  life  is  ended.  In 
1  Cor.  14 :  17,  it  is  said  that  "  the  kingdom  of  God 
is  not  meat  and  drink  but  righteousness  and  peace 
and  joy  in  the  Holy  Ghost."  Here  in  a  general 
way,  the  word  expressed  in  part  Christ's  conception 
of  the  universal  kingdom,  but  still  it  is  mixed  up 
and  put  in  contrast  with  the  Old  Testament  idea  of 
the  kingdom  which  was  largely  one  of  form  and 
outward  service. 

The  second  strange  fact  to  be  accounted  for  is 
that  the  apostles  and-  their  successors  not  only 
practically  discarded  the  word  kingdom  from  their 
vocabulary,  but  they  substituted  a  newly  coined 
word,  at  that  time  of  very  indefinite  and  undefined 
meaning,  in  its  place.  That  word  is  translated 
Church,  a  term  that  appears  nearly  a  hundred 
times,  in  their  writings,  to  one  of  the  kingdom. 

N'ow  be  it  observed  that  this  word  Church  is 


32  THE  GOSPEL  OF  TEE  KINGDOM. 

wholly  foreign  to  the  Old  Testament,  not  so  much 
as  once  appearing  there.  I  know  that  modern 
writers  talk  about  the  Jewish  and  Hebrew  Church 
and  try  to  read  its  meaning  into  the  Jewish  and 
Hebrew  institutions;  but  those  institutions  were 
kingly  in  their  constitution,  and  were  wholly  dif- 
ferent in  their  nature  from  the  later  idea  of  the 
Church. 

Then  again,  let  it  be  considered  that  in  the  four 
gospels  the  word  Church  occurs  but  twice,  and  both 
instances  are  in  the  gospel  of  Matthew  alone ;  and  that 
in  both  cases  the  word  is  used  in  such  an  indefinite 
sense  as  to  make  its  meaning  very  uncertain. 
Clearly  it  has  no  such  meaning  there  as  the  word 
Church,  a  century  later  came  to  signify.  In  Mat- 
thew 16  :  18,  where  Christ  says  to  Peter,—"  On  this 
rock  will  I  build  My  Church,"  His  meaning  both  as 
to  rock  and  Church  is,  and  always  has  been  in  dis- 
pute. Christ's  meaning  here  of  the  word  Church 
was  as  different  from  the  later  Koman  Catholic 
conception  as  day  is  from  night.  In  the  other 
passage,  Matthew  18 :  17,  where  Jesus  says,  ^Hell  it 
to  the  Church,"  the  question  naturally  arises  as  in 
the  other  case, — What  definitely  does  the  word 
Church  here  signify  ?  It  is  a  new  word  of  which 
we    have  no    knowledge  until   we  find    it  here. 


THE  SUBSTITUTION  OF  THE  CHURCH,  33 

"Whence  came  it  ?  From  what  is  it  derived,  and 
what,  here,  is  its  real  meaning  ?  If,  as  some  sup- 
pose, the  idea  of  the  Church  is  suggested  by  the 
Jewish  Synagogue,  why  then  was  not  that  the 
proper  name  for  it  ?  Doubtless  there  was  some- 
thing of  likeness  between  the  synagogue  and  the 
Church,  or  what  was  called  the  Church,  at  the 
beginning ;  and  yet  they  were  different  even  then. 
Others,  and  rightly,  as  I  believe,  derive  the  term 
vChurch  from  the  Greek  vv^ord,  ehhlesia.  But  the 
classical  and  proper  signification  of ,  ekklesia  is  an 
assembly  or  congregation.  It  may  be  an  assembly 
called  out  for  any  purpose,  political,  military,  or 
religious.  The  word  does  not  imply  a  permanent 
organization ;  it  is  simply  a  collection  of  people 
gathered  for  some  common  purpose.  This  is  some- 
thing very  different  from  the  modern  or  ancient 
idea  of  the  Church.  It  is  indeed  probable  that  the 
early  Christian  Churches  were  little  if  anything 
more  than  regular  gatherings  of  the  people  for 
worship.  If  they  had  any  organization  it  was  of 
the  simplest  kind.  They  had  no  creed  or  constitu- 
tion. They  were  simply  an  ecclesia,  a  congrega- 
tion of  Christian  people ;  and  to  my  mind,  the 
word  Church  throughout  the  ISTew  Testament  might 
better  have  been  translated  Congregation,  as,  in 


34  TEE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOBI. 

some  translations  it  has  been.  Such  a  rendering 
would  express  the  primitive  idea  more  accurately 
than  the  word  Church  has  done.  At  most,  what 
was  called  the  Church  was  a  very  simpip  thing  to 
which,  in  time,  an  entirely  new  meaning  was  at- 
tached, and  a  meaning  that  the  word  kingdom 
could  never  have  suggested,  a  meaning  that  the 
primitive  disciples  never  dreamed  of,  even  as  a 
future  possibility. 

But  this  subject  of  the  substitution  of  Church  for 
kingdom,  and  what  came  of  it,  will  be  more  fully 
considered  in  the  next  chapter  on  the  good  and  evil 
that  have  resulted  from  the  substitution. 

"We  are  now  arrived  at  a  question  of  exceeding 
interest  and  one  that  calls  for  careful  thought. 
Did  the  apostles  deliberately  and  intentionally  sub- 
stitute the  term  Church  for  kingdom,  giving  to  the 
new  word  a  different  and  narrower  meaning  than 
Christ's  term  conveyed  ?  and,  if  they  did  this  how 
came  they  to  do  it?  They  certainly  knew  that 
Christ's  preaching  was  mainly  of  the  kingdom. 
They  did  not  think  themselves  wiser  than  their 
Lord,  nor  did  they  mean  to  be  disloyal  to  Him,  or 
to  reject  or  undervalue  anything  that  He  had 
spoken. 

As  suggestive  of  the  right  answer  to  our  ques- 


THE  SUBSTITUTION  OF  THE  CHURCH,  35 

tion  a  few  words  of  generalization  may  be  useful. 
Every  great  teacher  and  leader  of  men  is  in  ad- 
vance of  his  own  age.  There  are  millions  of  people 
who  seem  content  to  trudge  along  in  the  exact 
tracks  which  their  fathers  trod.  They  have  no 
idea  of  progress  and  no  belief  that  anything  better 
than  they  now  have  is  possible.  Such  people  are 
found  in  all  the  avocations  of  life ;  among  farmers, 
mechanics,  tradesmen  and,  to  some  extent,  in  the 
professions.  There  are  clergymen  who  never  go 
beyond  their  people;  traditions  and  creeds  limit 
them.  They  preach  familiar  platitudes.  Like  a 
door  on  its  hinges  they  come  and  go,  but  make  no 
progress.  The  kaleidoscope,  with  its  bits  of  colored 
glass  turned  this  Avay  and  that,  gives  many  com- 
binations of  form  and  color,  but  the  same  bits  of 
glass  are  in  them  all.  This  is  a  representative 
instrument.  Such  people  of  every  class  are  useful 
members  of  society,  and  the  world  could  not  get  on 
without  them;  but  they  are  followers  after,  and 
not  leaders  of  men. 

Born  leaders,  I  repeat,  are  in  advance  of  their 
own  day,  and  are  not  understood  and  appreciated 
by  their  own  generation.  The  Bible  and  the  great 
characters  of  the  Bible  are  illustrations.  JSToah, 
Abraham,  Moses,  Isaiah  and  many  others  are  ex- 


36  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

amples.  They  were  not  understood  by  the  people 
of  their  times  as  they  are  by  us  to-day.  This  age 
has  even  passed  the  goal  at  which  many  of  those 
old  reformers  halted.  The  Avorld  is  ever  onward, 
so  that  the  advance  of  one  age  is  the  rear  of  the 
succeeding  one. 

Of  all  the  great  leaders  and  teachers  of  men 
Jesus  Christ  is  the  most  profound,  far-seeing  and, 
to  the  people  of  His  day  He  was  the  most  enigmatic 
and  mysterious  of  teachers.  He  laid  down  great 
principles,  He  brought  into  view  the  deepest  and 
most  spiritual  truths  of  the  kingdom  of  God,  but  He 
did  not  undertake  the  then  useless  task  of  fully  ex- 
plaining the  exact  meaning  of  His  words.  He  left 
that  for  time  and  the  Spirit  of  the  Lord  to  reveal. 
His  own  apostles  did  not  comprehend  Him.  Their 
minds  were  not  then  so  enlightened  and  spiritu- 
ally evolved  as  to  enable  them  clearly  to  under- 
stand just  Avhat  and  how  much  Jesus  meant  by  the 
kingdom,  in  His  teaching.  They  understood  Him  in 
part,  but  their  minds  were  confused;  His  words 
were  often  so  mysterious  and  profound  that  they 
were  not  able  to  grasp  His  deep  meaning  and  to  re- 
peat understandingly,  His  teachings  of  the  gospel 
of  the  kingdom ;  and  so,  rather  than  fall  into  mis- 
takes they  started  out  on  a  somewhat  lower  plane 


THE  SUBSTITUTION  OF  THE  CHURCH.  37 

where  their  thoughts  were  clear.  If  they  spoke  at 
all  they  must  stand  on  a  basis  where  they  could 
speak  understandingly  from  clear  conviction,  in 
demonstration  of  the  Spirit  and  with  power.  This 
was  the  utmost  they  could  do ;  it  was  this  or 
nothing. 

Let  persons  who  are  disposed  to  shrink  from  the 
explanation  here  involved  recall  again  that,  as  a 
matter  of  fact,  Jesus  was  not  comprehended  by  the 
people  of  His  own  day;  and  not  while  He  lived,  to 
any  large  extent,  by  His  chosen  twelve.  The  proof 
of  this  appears  continually.  True,  their  minds 
were  greatly  enlightened  after  the  pentecostal 
manifestation  of  the  Spirit ;  but  even  then  they  did 
not  see,  and  so  could  not  teach,  as  deeply  as  their 
Master  had  done.  After  centuries  may  not  blame 
them ;  for  even  down  to  this  day,  our  Lord's  teach- 
ing of  the  kingdom  is  little  more  than  half  com- 
prehended. The  apostles  went  as  far  as  they  saw 
and  knew  ;  they  could  not  have  gone  further ;  and 
doubtless  they  were  right  in  judging  that  they 
could  do  better  work  for  God  and  man  by  preach- 
ing on  the  plane  of  the  Congregation,  afterwards 
called  Church,  than  by  undertaking  to  stand  on 
that  of  the  kingdom.  To  have  done  otherwise  in 
their  circumstances  would  have  involved  a  misjudg- 


38  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM, 

ment  that  must  have  led  to  weakness  and  failure. 
It  would  have  made  them  uncertain,  vacillating, 
and  often  negative  in  their  preaching,  and  so  might 
have  defeated  the  establishment  of  Christianity  in 
the  world.  Men  must  be  clear  and  positive  in 
their  apprehensions  of  truth  or  they  are  power- 
less as  public  teachers.  Suppose  that  Paul,  for 
example,  who  though  not  one  of  the  twelve 
apostles,  did  more  than  they  all  to  extend  and 
establish  the  Christian  religion,  had  been  in  doubt 
as  to  whether  or  not  his  preaching  was  in  ac- 
cord with  what  Jesus  would  have  him  preach ; 
what  except  disheartenment  and  failure  would  have 
been  the  result  ?  The  apostles  were  right  in  going  as 
far  as  they  clearly  saw  and  no  farther.  They  used 
the  term  Congregation,  afterwards  called  Church, 
not  in  the  sense  of  a  closely  organized  ecclesias- 
tical administrative  institution.  They  would  have 
shrunk  from  that  idea,  because  Jesus  never  sug- 
gested such  an  organization  or  any  other.  He 
placed  all  Christians  on  an  equality  and  forbade 
lordship  among  them.  "What  the  apostles  meant 
by  Congregation  or  Church  was  the  gathering,  and 
place  of  gathering,  of  the  people  for  religious  serv- 
ice. Close  organization  was  not  a  part  of  their 
plan  or  practice.     That  was  an  after  innovation. 


THE  SUBSTITUTION  OF  THE  CHURCH.  39 

It  may  be  objected  again,  that  the  apostles,  in- 
spired men,  could  not  have  been  in  an  attitude  of  un- 
certainty as  to  what  Christ  meant  by  the  king- 
dom ;  and  that,  if  they  did  not  fully  comprehend 
His  meaning  while  He  was  with  them  they  must 
have  done  so  after  the  Pentecostal  baptism.  If 
that  were  true,  and  if  from  that  day  they  fully  saw 
and  understood  all  that  Jesus  saw  and  said,  why 
then  did  they  not  continue  to  emphasize  our  Lord's 
teaching  of  the  kingdom?  Nowhere  does  Jesus 
even  hint  that  His  message  of  the  kingdom  was  to 
be  changed  to  that  of  the  Church.  And,  besides, 
the  theory  that  encircled  the  objection  assumes  that 
there  are  no  degrees  of  inspiration,  and  that  the 
apostolic  knowledge  concerning  the  kingdom  must 
have  been  complete  and  final.  Such  a  view  is  mis- 
leading and  contradictory  of  facts.  The  Bible  is  a 
progressive  book.  The  apostles  were  as  far  in  ad- 
vance of  Moses  as  Christ  was  in  advance  of  the 
apostles. 

The  apostles  went  as  far  as  their  inspiration  car- 
ried them.  They  clearly  apprehended  much  of 
what  Christ  meant  by  the  Good  News,  translated 
gospel,  which  He  had  brought  into  the  world ;  and 
they  preached  that  gospel  to  lost  men  with  clear- 
ness and  power.     From  their  day  to  this  the  Church 


40  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

has  had  the  right  conception  of  man's  duty  to  his 
God.  The  duty  of  repentance,  faith,  consecration 
and  love  of  God  revealed  in  Jesus  Christ  has  been 
clearly  apprehended  and  faithfully  preached.  Yery 
much  of  what  Jesus  meant  by  the  kingdom  has 
been,  from  the  first  till  now,  embodied  in  the 
Church  ;  and  many  Christian  people  have  regarded 
the  two  as  identical.  Taking  this  view  it  has  been 
claimed  and  understood  that  whatever  of  real 
spiritual  good  there  is  in  the  w^orld  comes  through 
the  Church  ;  and  that  whatever  is  not  of  the  Church 
is  of  little  or  no  religious  value.  It  may  be  useful 
in  a  temporal  point  of  view,  but  it  is  no  part  of  true 
religion  in  the  sight  of  God. 

This  may  be  the  true  conception  of  the  Church 
as  it  has  existed  through  all  the  centuries,  but  it  is 
not  the  true  conception  of  the  gospel  of  the  king- 
dom as  Jesus  proclaimed  it.  The  kingdom  is  a 
larger  and  broader  thing  than  the  Church  ever  has 
been,  or,  in  the  nature  of  things,  can  be.  The 
kingdom  embraced  all  of  good  there  is  in  the 
Church,  and  much  besides  which  the  Church  has 
not  recognized.  It  is  more  man-ward  than  the 
Church  has  ever  been.  Every  movement  in  the 
world,  as  we  have  seen,  that  tends  to  the  uplifting 
of  man,  and  that  draws  God  ward,  is  an  element  of 


THE  SUBSTITUTION  OF  THE  CHURCH.  41 

the  kingdom.  Doubtless  multitudes  of  people  are 
in  the  kingdom  who  are  not  in  the  Church,  and 
who,  for  one  reason  or  another,  could  not  enter  it. 
The  point  I  make  is  that  the  Church  and  the  king- 
dom are  not  synonymous.  One  is  vastly  greater 
than  the  other ;  and  that  all  the  Christian  centu- 
ries have  been  content  to  preach  the  gospel  of  the 
Church,  while  Christ  preached  the  gospel  of  the 
kingdom.  From  the  first,  the  Church  has  been 
coming  more  and  more  into  prominence,  and  the 
kingdom  has  been  receding  from  view ;  the  Church 
has  been  coming,  as  the  centuries  advanced,  to  be 
an  end  in  itself,  rather  than  a  means  to  a  greater 
end  beyond  itself.  To  build  up  the  Church  rather 
than  the  kingdom  has  been,  and  still  is,  apparently, 
the  practical  aim  of  Church  people  the  world  over. 
This  was  not  our  Lord's  view,  nor  was  it  that  of 
His  apostles. 

Of  late  this  order  of  things  has  begun  to  change. 
Progressive  Christian  people  are  beginning  to  see 
and  feel  that  our  Lord's  conception  of  the  kingdom, 
which  is  vastly  larger  than  any  conception  of  the 
Church  has  ever  been,  is  the  true  and  working  con- 
ception. Advance  in  mental  and  moral  evolution 
is  preparing  for  this  larger  view.  At  the  present 
time  we  are  hearing  more  about  the  kingdom,  and 


42  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

of  the  kingdom  as  a  substitute  for  the  Church,  than 
has  been  heard  in  all  the  preceding  Christian  cen- 
turies. The  necessity  for  a  broader  view  of  relig- 
ion is  beginning  to  be  extensively  felt  in  the 
Church  and  out  of  it.  Turn  where  we  will  and  re- 
ligious people  are  talking  about  the  kingdom ;  and 
this  idea  is  one  of  constant  growth.  If  it  continues 
to  grow  as  it  has  done  for  the  last  fifty  years  the 
kingdom,  and  not  the  Church,  will  soon  be  the  cen- 
tre of  religious  interest.  The  kingdom  is  coming 
back  to  the  place  that  Jesus  gave  it,  as  He  is  re- 
ported in  the  gospels. 

Should  that  time  ever  arrive  many  great  ques- 
tions that  have  long  been  subjects  of  controversy 
will  find  a  rational  and  permanent  settlement.  In 
that  day,  among  other  changes,  would  not  Church 
names,  creeds  and  forms,  with  the  controversies 
they  originate,  be  lost  sight  of,  and  be  merged  in 
the  kingdom  as  rivers  are  merged  in  the  mighty 
ocean  ?  Will  that  day  ever  dawn  upon  the  world  ? 
This  great  question  demands  an  answer. 


III. 

THE   GOOD  AND   THE  EYIL  THAT  HAVE 
KESULTED  FROM  THAT  SUBSTITUTION. 


III. 


THE   GOOD   AND   THE   EVIL   THAT  HAVE  RESULTED 
FROM   THAT   SUBSTITUTION. 

The  two  great  facts  that  have  claimed  attention 
hitherto  are : 

1.  The  gospel  of  the  kingdom  as  preached  by 
Christ  Himself ;  and  2.  The  gospel  of  the  Church 
substituted  for  that  of  the  kingdom  as  preached  by 
the  apostles  and  their  successors.  We  have  seen 
in  a  general  way  that  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom 
was  a  greater  gospel  than  was  that  of  the  Church. 
This  difference  in  character  must  of  necessity  lead 
to  difference  of  result. 

It  is  the  purpose  of  this  chapter,  therefore,  to 
trace  the  results,  good  and  evil,  that  have  come 
from  the  substitution  of  the  term  Church  for  king- 
dom. In  the  preceding  chapters  these  two  terms 
have  been  studied  separately,  with  the  promise  that 
when  they  should  come  together,  as  they  now  do, 
that  the  two,  by  comparison,  should  be  more  fully 
differentiated.     The   question   now  is   as  to  their 

agreement  and  their  diversity. 

45 


46  TEE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM,  ' 

Happily,  what,  for  convenience,  I  have  called 
the  two  gospels  agree  perfectly  as  to  the  great  end 
to  be  accomplished.  That  common  end  is  the  sa- 
ving of  the  world,  individually  and  collectively,  from 
sin  and  death,  and  the  bringing  of  all  men  into  the 
possession  of  everlasting  life.  Jesus  expressed  that 
one  great  purpose  when  He  said  :  God  so  loved  the 
world  that  He  gave  His  only  begotten  Son  that 
whosoever  believeth  in  Him  should  not  perish  but 
have  everlasting  life.  For  God  sent  not  His  Son  into 
the  world  to  condemn  the  world  but  that  the  world 
through  Him  might  be  saved.  When  it  is  seen  and 
conceded  that  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom  and  the 
gospel  of  the  Church  have  this  great  common  end  of 
pursuit,  the  difference  between  them  cannot  be  vital, 
and  must  consist  chiefly  in  difference  of  breadth  and 
method.  Both  the  kingdom  and  the  Church  would 
convert  the  entire  world  to  Christ ;  but  their 
methods  differ.  The  Church,  as  we  have  seen, 
would  convert  men,  one  at  a  time,  here  and  there, 
as  opportunity  offered,  and  would  depend  chiefly 
upon  individualistic  work  for  success.  While  the 
gospel  of  the  kingdom  does  not  ignore,  but  empha- 
sizes the  importance  of  individual  conversions,  it 
takes  a  larger  view  of  the  whole  subject.  It  aims 
to  instruct,  uplift  and  convert  whole  communities. 


Tm:  GOOD  AND  THE  EVIL.  47 

organizations,  nations  and  races,  as  such,  and  so 
save  the  world.  It  therefore  regards  every  move- 
ment out  of  the  Church  as  well  as  in,  that  tends  to 
the  betterment  of  man,  to  the  elevation  of  society, 
and,  especially  the  uplifting  of  what  are  called  the 
masses  of  ignorant  and  needy  people  as  important 
and  necessary  elements  in  the  gospel  of  the  king- 
dom. Therefore  art,  literature,  science,  business, 
national  purity  and  civilization  generally  belong  to 
the  kingdom,  as  they  have  not  belonged  to  the 
Church.  Indeed,  such  general  movements  have, 
for  the  most  part,  been  carried  on  outside  and  in- 
dependently of,  the  Church;  and  she  has  looked 
upon  them  often  as  outside  of  religion,  and  some- 
times its  enemy,  with  which  she  must  have  little  or 
nothing  to  do.  If  ministers  have  ventured  to 
preach  upon  these  subjects,  as  some  have,  of  late, 
they  have  been  in  some  quarters  rebuked  for  neg- 
lecting the  gospel  to  preach  politics  and  follow 
after  the  world.  The  gospel  of  the  Church  has  no 
room  for  anything  but  the  preaching  of  Christ  and 
Him  crucified,  for  the  direct  saving  of  souls ;  all 
else  has  been  considered  a  profanation  of  the  pulpit. 
Let  me  try  to  present  this  difference  between  the 
gospel  of  the  kingdom  and  the  gospel  of  the 
Church,  by  introducing  a  very  homely  illustration. 


48  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINJDOM, 

The  first  city  of  Chicago  was  built  on  low,  swampy 
land,  and  years  afterwards  had  to  be  lifted  out  of 
the  mud  and  placed  on  a  higher  and  firmer  founda- 
tion. There  were  two  possible  ways  of  procedure. 
One  was  to  take  down,  stone  by  stone,  every  build- 
ing, lay  a  suitable  foundation,  and  then  reerect  the 
city,  stone  by  stone,  as  was  done  at  the  beginning. 
This  would  conform  to  the  Church  idea  of  recon- 
structing the  world.  The  other  method  of  reaching 
the  same  end,  and  the  one  actually  employed,  was 
to  place  mighty  levers  and  screws  under  whole 
blocks  of  great  buildings,  and  raise  them,  all  to- 
gether, to  the  desired  height,  and  build  under  them 
a  solid  foundation.  By  this  process,  street  after 
street  was  elevated,  till  the  whole  city  was  lifted 
out  of  the  slough.  This  second  process  represents 
the  gospel  of  the  kingdom  ;  and  accomplishes  with 
ease,  and  at  small  cost,  what  the  first  plan  would 
have  failed  to  do,  or,  at  best,  could  only  have  been 
done  at  limitless  cost  of  time,  labor  and  expense. 
So,  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom,  by  means  of  moral 
levers  and  screws  of  civilization  from  outside  the 
Church,  largely,  is  steadily  uplifting  communities, 
nations  and  the  world  out  of  the  mud  of  selfish- 
ness, that  they  may  stand  on  the  Eock  of  Ages. 
Both  gospels  seek  the  same  end,  one  by  slender 


THE  GOOD  AND  THE  EVIL.  49 

agencies  that  endeavor  to  save  individuals;  the 
other  by  broad  evolutionary  movements  that  under- 
lie, move  and  uplift  the  world. 

What  might  have  followed  had  the  preaching  of 
the  kingdom  as  Jesus  apprehended  it,  continued,  we 
cannot  tell,  because  we  have  no  actual  data  on 
which  to  base  a  calculation.  Potential  history  is  a 
thing  of  the  imagination.  But  as  regards  the 
gospel  of  the  Church  that  has  been  preached 
throughout  Christendom  for  nearly  two  thousand 
years,  the  case  is  wholly  different.  The  history  is 
before  us  for  study  and  conclusion  ;  so  that  the 
good  and  the  evil  that  have  come  from  it,  and  from 
the  transfer,  are  apparent. 

What  then,  are  some  of  the  advantages  and 
blessings  that  have  come  to  the  world  from  the 
substitution  of  Church  for  kingdom,  as  they  stand 
revealed  in  Church  history  ?  Only  the  briefest 
outline  can  here  be  given.  The  good  that  has  come 
through  the  Church  is  incalculably  great. 

In  the  first  place,  the  transfer  placed  the  apostles 
and  their  associates  on  grounds  that  they  clearly 
understood.  As  we  have  seen,  our  Lord's  concep- 
tion of  the  kingdom  was  too  deep  for  them.  They 
only  in  part  comprehended  it.  They  saw  clearly 
that  the  preaching  of  the  gospel  to  individual  souls 


50  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM, 

for  their  conversion  and  salvation  belonged  to 
Christ's  plan,  and  was  foremost  in  it,  for  saving 
the  world.  This  was  a  great  idea,  great  enough  to 
fill  their  souls  and  inspire  their  energies  ;  and  they 
gave  themselves  unreservedly  to  that  work,  and 
with  what  grand  results!  Had  they  stopped  to 
inquire  fully,  what  Jesus  meant  by  the  kingdom, 
and  then  tried  to  express  His  meaning,  without 
clearl}''  understanding  it,  they  would  have  been 
shorn  of  their  strength.  Experimental  movements 
are  always  weak  and  of  uncertain  results.  The 
apostles  were  not  experimenting ;  they  knew 
whereof  they  affirmed  ;  and  it  was  this  confidence 
that  gave  them  power. 

Then,  again,  the  world  as  it  then  existed,  was 
better  prepared  for  the  preaching  of  the  gospel  of 
the  Church  than  it  was  for  that  of  the  kingdom. 
It  was  in  a  condition  to  appreciate  truths  that  came 
home  to  individual  consciences,  but  was  not  then 
able  to  enter  into  great  general  movements  for  the 
uplifting  of  the  world,  as  Jesus'  history  reveals. 
For  the  apostolic  call  to  repentance  and  faith  in 
Christ,  men  were  prepared,  as  results  show. 
Further  than  this  they  could  not  have  been  led. 

Let  us  now  glance  down  the  track  of  history  and 
see  what  infinite  good  the  gospel  of  the  Church  has 


THE  GOOD  AND  THE  EVIL.  51 

brought  to  the  world.  The  good  news  of  salvation 
through  Christ  has  been  kept  aflame  before  the  eyes 
of  men.  The  great  truths  of  religion  have  been 
conserved.  If  at  times  they  have  been  partly  ob- 
scured by  tradition,  and  false  doctrine,  and  worse 
practice,  yet  truth  has  ever  been  her  own  vindi- 
cator, so  that  in  the  darkest  days  a  light  has  shone 
from  the  Church  for  the  saving  of  the  people. 

What  countless  multitudes  have  been  brought  to 
Christ  and  to  heaven,  through  the  agency  of  the 
Christian  Church ;  and  what  multitudes  of  grand 
men  and  women  have  been  raised  up  to  labor,  suffer 
and  die  in  their  Master's  service  !  And  never  in 
the  world's  history  was  the  number  of  such  people 
greater  than  it  is  to-day. 

The  world  has  been  advanced  through  the  influ- 
ence of  the  Church,  not  indeed,  as  it  might  and 
should  have  been ;  but  the  civilized  world  and  even 
pagan  lands,  through  Christian  missions,  are  much 
nearer  the  kingdom  to-day  than  they  would  have 
been  but  for  the  influence  of  the  Christian  Church. 
Imperfect  as  the  Church  has  been  and  is,  she  is  yet 
the  best  institution  the  world  has  ever  seen.  Con- 
sider what  would  follow  if  the  Church  were  blotted 
out  of  existence  !  Even  her  enemies  would  stand 
aghast   at  the   thought   of   such  a  calamity.     Re- 


52  TEE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM, 

cently,  in  conversation  with  an  intelligent  and  edu- 
cated man,  he  said  to  me :  "  I  am  not  a  believer  in 
the  Christian  religion ;  I  never  attend  Church,  but 
I  help  support  it,  and  should  consider  its  overthrow 
one  of  the  greatest  of  calamities."  I  honored  the 
man's  intuitions  more  than  his  judgment. 

This  brief  statement  is  sufficient  to  reveal  the 
author's  love  and  appreciation  of  the  Christian 
Church.  It  is  born  of  God  and  cannot  die ;  though 
it  may  be  reformed,  enlarged  and  merged,  as  it 
never  yet  has  fully  been,  in  the  gospel  of  the 
kingdom. 

It  has  been  intimated  that  great  evils  have  come 
from  the  substitution  of  Church  for  kingdom,  as 
the  working  centre  of  Christianity.  It  is  the 
further  purpose  of  this  chapter  briefly  to  expose 
these  evils.     "What  are  they  ? 

The  kingdom,  as  we  have  seen,  is  larger  than  the 
Church.  They  both  seek  the  same  end,  but  the 
greater  includes  the  less,  while  the  less  does  not  in- 
clude the  greater.  Just  here  lies  the  beginning  of 
the  evil.  The  Church  as  it  has  existed  through  the 
centuries,  represents  only  a  half  truth  ;  and  a  half 
truth  is  a  practical  error  and  must,  sooner  or  later, 
make  itself  appear  as  such.  History  abounds  in 
illustrations  of  this  fact.      The  Church  has  been 


THE  GOOD  AND  THE  EVIL.  53 

weak  in  many  directions  where  she  ought  to  have 
been  strong.  She  has  undervalued  ethical  culture 
and  general  morality  in  the  world.  She  has  at 
least  discounted  moral  and  reformatory  movements 
carried  on,  often,  outside  the  Church.  Indeed,  her 
general  position  through  the  centuries  has  been 
that  whatever  is  not  of,  in,  and  under  the  Church 
can  have  little  or  no  true  religious  value.  Conse- 
quently, the  Church  has  ever  been  opposed  to  most 
scientific  investigations  and  conclusions,  and  to 
whatever  lines  of  advancement  that  have  not  origi- 
nated with,  and  been  controlled  by,  herself.  All 
this  has  flowed  naturally  from  the  narrow  base  on 
which  she  has  stood.  Had  the  gospel  of  the  Church 
been  as  large  as  that  of  Christ's  kingdom,  such  a 
history  would  have  been  impossible.  It  is  because 
she  has  only  recognized,  and  acted  upon,  a  half 
truth  instead  of  a  whole  one,  that  her  narrowness 
and  want  of  sympathy  with  wise  movements  out- 
side of  the  Church  have  been  so  painfully  apparent, 
and  so  injurious  both  to  herself  and  the  world. 

Let  me  now  come  to  some  particulars.  And, 
first  of  all,  this  narrow  one-sided  platform  of  the 
Church  opened  the  way  for  the  growing  up  of  that 
cruel,  crushing  system  of  ecclesiasticism  that  suc- 
ceeded the  apostolic  age,  and  for  a  thousand  years 


54  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

ruled  and  cursed  the  religious  world,  and  whose 
power  is  not  yet  broken.  Jesus  never  authorized 
or  suggested  any  system  of  ecclesiastical  govern- 
ment. He  put,  as  we  have  seen,  all  His  disciples  on 
an  equality  one  with  another.  He  said,  If  any  man 
will  be  a  ruler  among  you,  let  him  be  a  servant. 
Had  the  broad  base  of  the  kingdom,  as  Jesus  saw 
it,  been  apprehended  and  adhered  to  from  the  first, 
and  afterwards,  there  could  have  been  no  room  for 
those  ambitions  and  graspings  after  power  that 
marked  the  last  half  of  the  first  century,  and  in- 
creased afterwards,  until  that  gigantic  hierarchy, 
known  as  the  Koman  Church,  was  established  as 
the  seat  of  all  wisdom  and  power.  That  some  good 
has  come  from  Church  governments,  is  not  denied ; 
but  how  vast  have  been  the  evils !  most  of  which 
would  have  been  averted  if  the  simple  preaching  of 
the  kingdom,  on  our  Lord's  broad  basis  had  been 
apprehended  and  followed  in  after  generations. 
The  principles  and  interest  of  the  kingdom  are 
common  property,  and  can  no  more  be  monopolized 
and  controlled  by  ambitious  and  grasping  men 
than  can  the  rain,  the  atmosphere  and  the  sunshine 
that  come  from  God,  alike  upon  the  good  and  the  evil. 
Another  evil  that  has  grown  out  of  the  narrow 
working  ideal  of  the  Church,  and  the  ecclesiasticism 


THE  GOOD  AND  THE  EVIL.  55 

that  has  overshadowed  it,  is  the  disposition  and 
ability  to  formulate  cast-iron  dogmas  for  the  per- 
petual assent  of  the  Christian  world  ;  and  dogmas, 
some  of  which  are  repugnant  to  the  judgment,  the 
conscience  and  the  moral  intuitions  of  mankind. 
My  self-appointed  limits  forbid  specification,  nor  is 
specification  necessary,  as  every  intelligent  person 
knows  just  where  specifications  apply.  These  dogmas 
have  been  made  by  human  edicts,  so  sacred  that  who- 
ever has  doubted  or  denied  them  has  been  counted 
unfit  for  Church  membership,  even  though  he  be- 
longed to  Christ's  kingdom.  Such  arbitrariness  our 
Lord's  larger  platform  could  never  have  allowed. 
Here,  loyalty  to  Christ  is  the  only  test  of  fellowship ; 
and  equally  so  whether  such  loyalty  is  found  in  the 
Church  or  out  of  it. 

One  other,  and  the  greatest  of  the  evils  that 
have  come  from  the  substitution,  is  the  spirit  of 
rivalry,  of  division  and  of  sectarianism,  which  the 
narrower  conception  of  the  Church  has  generated 
and  produced,  but  which  the  larger  gospel  of  the 
kingdom  would  have  made  impossible.  Jesus 
prayed  that  His  disciples  might  be  one,  even  as  He 
and  His  Father  were  one ;  and  the  apostles  plead 
for  the  same  unity.  But  even  then  some  were  for 
Paul,   some    for    ApoUos    and   some  for  Cephas. 


58  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

Before  the  close  of  the  first  century  the  evil  spirit 
of  ambition  and  love  of  leadership,  was  a  control- 
ling force ;  and  a  force  that  ever  increased  in  power, 
enkindling  controversy,  denunciation  and  persecu- 
tion, which  was  the  disgrace  of  the  early,  and  even 
of  later  Christian  centuries. 

One  outcome  of  the  conflict  was  the  division  of 
the  ancient  Church  into  what  was  known  as  the 
Eastern  and  Western  Churches ;  the  seat  of  one, 
Constantinople,  and  of  the  other,  Kome.  In  the 
western  section  the  struggle  went  on  until,  at 
length,  the  Eoman  hierarchy  was  firmly  estab- 
lished that  for  a  thousand  years  ruled,  with  a  rod 
of  iron,  both  Church  and  State,  in  all  western 
Europe.  As  a  natural  result,  the  car  of  progress 
rested,  and  ignorance,  superstition  and  formality 
miscalled  religion,  was  well-nigh  universal.  Doubt- 
less there  were  good  men  and  women  in  those  days, 
but  they  were  bound  hand  and  foot  in  the  network, 
of  ecclesiastical  despotism.  Darkness,  as  we  have 
seen,  reigned  for  ten  centuries,  chiefly  because  the 
Church  had  displaced  the  kingdom. 

The  Keformation  of  the  sixteenth  century  rent 
the  corrupt  Eoman  Church  in  twain  and  established 
Protestantism  over  nearly  half  of  Europe.  This 
was  a  great  clearing  and  spiritually  clarifying  proc- 


THE  GOOD  AND  THE  EVIL.  57 

ess.  But  Church  narrowness  still  prevailed  and 
brought  in  other  evils,  different  in  their  nature,  but 
not  less  in  violation  of  the  spirit  and  principles  of 
the  kingdom  than  were  those  which  had  been  dis- 
placed. I  refer  now,  not  to  doctrines,  but  to  divi- 
sive and  sectarian  movements  that  rent  Protestant- 
ism into  hundreds  of  contending,  jealous,  and  rival 
fragments.  It  is  the  boast  of  Catholicism  that  she 
has  always  been  one  united  Church ;  it  is  the  weak- 
ness of  Protestant  Churches  that  they  are  not  large 
enough  in  thought,  and  in  love  for  God  and  man, 
to  bind  them  together  in  one  harmonious  body. 
The  heresy  prevailed  that,  if  Christians  did  not 
think  alike  on  all  subjects,  they  must  break  fellow- 
ship with  each  other,  go  off  by  themselves  and  form 
separate  denominations ;  a  thing  that  the  gospel  of 
the  kingdom  would  never  have  allowed  or  made 
possible.  The  cardinal  error  of  Protestantism  is, 
that  it  overlooks  the  central  fact  that  union  and 
communion  with  God,  as  revealed  in  Jesus  Christ 
is,  or  should  be,  the  one  and  only  Christian  test  of 
membership  and  fellowship  in  the  Christian  Church. 
"Where  intellect  is  exalted  above  heart-experience, 
there  can  be  no  real  unity  on  earth  or  in  heaven. 
Differences  of  opinion  must  always  exist  among 
finite  beings ;  God  only  knows  the  infinite. 


58  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

Yet,  there  are  people  who  believe  in  denomina- 
tionalism.  They  say  that  the  spirit  of  rivalry  in 
religion,  as  in  the  secular  world,  commands  more 
money,  time,  and  effort,  than  could  otherwise  be 
secured.  They  would  even  seek  to  harmonize  and 
save  the  world,  not  by  driving  selfishness  and  party 
rivalry  out  of  it,  but  by  so  balancing  one  form  of 
selfish  rivalry  against  another  so  as  to  secure  a 
measure  of  efficiency,  and  of  good  results,  that 
might  some  day  bring  harmony  and  peace  to  man- 
kind. If  this  theory  be  true,  Christianity  is  a  fail- 
ure. ]^o  balancing  of  selfish  schemes  can  save  the 
world,  or  do  otherwise  than  drag  it  downward. 
Alas,  for  religion  when  such  motives  are  stronger 
than  pure  love  for  God  and  man !  And  yet,  one 
cannot  help  fearing  that  much  of  what  is  called 
Christian  work  springs  from  no  higher  motive  than 
that  of  competition  and  rivalry.  How  must  Christ 
look  upon  such  so-called  service ! 

But,  again,  it  is  claimed  that  sectarianism,  and 
not  denominationalism,  is  the  evil  to  be  con- 
demned, as  if  the  two  were  not  one  and  in- 
separable. The  distinction  is  one  without  a  dif- 
ference. Denominationalism  is  the  root  out  of 
which  sectarian  zeal  grows  and  without  which  it 
could  not  exist  and  exploit  itself,  as  a  poor  counter- 


THE  GOOD  AND  THE  EVIL.  59 

feit  of  genuine  Christian  life.  One  involves  the 
other. 

Not  only  does  den omi nationalism  foster  envy- 
ings,  jealousies  and  counter  movements  for  party 
ends,  but  it  is  also  a  huge  spendthrift,  wasting  time, 
life,  and  vast  sums  of  money  to  no  good  purpose. 
In  hundreds  of  localities  it  tries  to  sustain,  often 
half-a-dozen  Churches,  where  one  united  Church 
would  do  more  good  than  all  of  them  combined. 
And,  moreover,  these  divisions  into  rival  sects  are 
the  great  stumbling-block  to  the  outside  world  that 
knows  their  meaning  and  folly.  This  is  also  the 
foremost  obstacle  to  successful  foreign  mission 
labor.  It  not  only  diverts  funds  from  the  Churches 
which  they  would  otherwise  receive,  but  it  em- 
barrasses missionaries,  and  exposes  them  to  criti- 
cisms which  they  cannot  answer.  And,  most  of  all, 
it  is  contrary  to  the  gospel  of  Christ's  kingdom. 

That  some  advantages  may  come  from  denomina- 
tionalism,  as  they  do  from  selfishness,  from  slavery, 
from  wars,  from  sin  in  general  and  from  the  devil, 
is  conceded.  But  the  evils  overbalance  the  good, 
a  hundredfold.  The  good  is  incidental,  while  the 
evils  are  inherent  and  vital. 

Here  the  question  naturally  arises :  Suppose 
that  the  gospel  of  the  Church  had  never  been  sub- 


60  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

stituted  for  that  of  the  kingdom,  and  that  the 
gospel  of  the  kingdom  had  continued  to  be  the 
ideal  of  Christendom,  would  not  the  same  evils  that 
have  been  described  have  followed  ?  Did  Christ's 
kingdom  contemplate  and  provide  for  such  evils? 
If  not,  and  its  principles  had  been  followed,  the 
evils  could  not  have  arisen.  I  concede  that  if  the 
kingdom  had  not  been  the  kingdom,  but  only  an- 
other name  for  Church,  the  results  might  have  been 
much  the  same.  But  if  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom 
had  been  fully  comprehended  and  carried  out  as 
Christ  conceived  and  preached  it,  then  the  results 
would  have  been  vastly  different.  The  kingdom 
would  have  included  everything  that  tends  directly, 
or  indirectly,  to  bring  the  world  to  God,  individually 
and  in  masses ;  and  so  great  a  conception  could  not 
have  been  monopolized  and  divided  into  fragments, 
any  more  than  duration  and  space  can. 

"Will  the  time  ever  come  when  the  Church  shall 
be  so  enlarged  and  spiritualized  as  fully  to  compre- 
hend our  Lord's  conception  of  the  kingdom  and  be 
merged  into  it?  That  would  be  indeed  a  grand 
consummation !  It  will  be  the  further  purpose  of 
these  chapters  to  show  that  such  a  result,  and  a  re- 
sult still  greater,  is  some  day  to  be  reached,  and  by 
what  agencies  all  this  is  to  be  accomplished. 


lY. 

THE   GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM  TO  BE- 
COME UISTIYEESAL. 


lY. 

THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM  TO  BECOME  UNI- 
VEESAL. 

Our  Lord  taught  us  to  pray ;  Thy  kingdom 
come,  Thy  will  be  done  on  earth  as  it  is  in  heaven. 
What  does  this  sublime  petition  mean  ?  And  on 
Avhat  grounds  may  we  be  assured  that  the  petition 
will  some  day  be  fully  answered  ?  These  questions 
do  not  contemplate  the  methods  by  which  Christ's 
kingdom  is  to  come  on  earth  as  it  is  in  heaven,  but 
the  great  and  inspiring  fact  that  it  will  so  come. 

One  fundamental  distinction  exists,  and  must  ever 
exist,  that  differentiates  earth  from  heaven.  On 
earth  physical  nature  abounds ;  in  heaven,  ethereal 
nature  superabounds.  While  both  of  these  natures 
are  real  and  not  imaginary,  there  is  a  deeper  real- 
ity and  one  more  abiding,  and  of  a  higher  nature 
in  ethereal  than  belongs  to  physical  nature.  And 
yet,  the  two  natures  are  not  wholly  distinct,  one 
from  the  other.  The  physical  world  in  which  we 
live  is  more  than  physical.  We  have  in  it,  indeed, 
a  continual  appeal  to  the  senses, — to  the  sense  of 

63 


64  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

sight,  of  hearing,  of  taste  and  of  touch ;  but  we 
have  more  than  this.  In  addition  to  what  is 
physical,  we  have  thought,  feeling,  volition  and  life ; 
which,  though  not  material,  are  real.  Mind,  no 
less  than  matter  is  everywhere  revealed  in  nature  ; 
and,  although  mind  is  invisible  and  intangible  to 
the  human  senses,  it  is  so  chiefly  because  mind  is 
higher  and  mightier  than  sense,  or  than  all  material 
things  with  which  sense  has  to  do.  The  material 
is  made  for  the  immaterial  and  not  the  reverse.  It 
is  the  truth,  the  life,  the  ethereal  which  dwells  in 
the  material,  that  gives  value  to  the  physical  world 
and  explains  its  existence.  At  best  the  physical  is 
but  the  shadow  of  the  spiritual.  The  sun  in  the 
heavens  foreshadows  the  invisible ; — it  reveals  the 
infinite  and  the  eternal,  even  more  than  it  displays 
its  own  glory.  The  seen  and  the  unseen  are  both 
needful ;  one,  as  a  means,  and  the  other  as  an  end. 
As  for  man  himself,  he  is  a  compound  of  the 
physical  and  ethereal.  Material  and  ethereal  ele- 
ments enter  into  his  being ;  but  what  those  ele- 
ments are,  primitively  considered,  is  something  that 
lies  beyond  the  reach  of  human  ken.  We  know 
that  the  mind  is  different  from,  and  more  than,  the 
body.  The  spirit,  not  the  body,  is  the  Ego,  the 
personality,  that  resides  in  the  body,  much  as  men 


TO  BECOME  UNIVERSAL,  65 

live  in  houses,  and  moths  in  cocoons.  The  soul  is 
not  only  the  maker  and  the  life  of  the  body,  but  it 
is  the  seat  of  consciousness,  and  of  all  that  con- 
scious personality  implies  and  explains.  It  is  that 
which  allies  us  to  God,  that  makes  us  His  children, 
and  He  our  Father,  and  which  binds  the  race,  and 
all  moral  beings,  in  the  golden  bonds  of  a  common 
brotherhood.  Spirit  is  life,  divine  life;  and  when 
it  becomes  allied  to  God  in  love,  confidence,  fellow- 
ship and  sweet  sympathy,  it  becomes  consciously, 
eternal  life. 

It  is  doubtless  good  for  the  conscious  human 
spirit  to  begin  its  moral  existence  in  a  material 
body.  Indeed,  it  could  not  begin  otherwise  and  be 
in  harmony  with  divine  order,  or  God's  evolution- 
ary method,  which  is  to  advance  through  the  less 
perfect  to  the  more  perfect.  The  spirit  needs  just 
that  training,  discipline  and  experience  which  life 
in  an  animal  body  necessitates.  The  body  is  the 
soul's  earthly  home,  and  should  be  treated  wisely, 
tenderly,  lovingly,  as  should  all  of  God's  good 
gifts.  At  the  same  time,  we  should  remember  that 
our  material  bodies  are  animal  and  not  spiritual, 
and  are  to  be  held  in  subjection  to  the  spirit,  and 
not  be  allowed  to  usurp  dominion  over  it.  God  has 
given  to  man  this  power ;  and  it  is  just  this  that 


66  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

ii  constitutes  him  a  child  of  God,  and  differentiates 
\     hiin  from  the  lower  animal  creation. 

I  believe  the  main  purpose  of  our  earthly  life  to 
be  the  cultivation  of  the  spirit ;  and  that  this  is  to 
be  secured,  not  by  any  single  fiat  of  man's  respon- 
sible power  of  choice,  nor  by  any  miraculous  fiat  of 
the  Almighty,  but  by  a  series  of  struggle  and 
growth  in  which  human  and  divine  agency  cooper- 
ate. Neither  power  can  succeed  without  the  other. 
The  sad  fact  is  that  for  the  most  part  the  animal 
in  man  has  dominated  the  spiritual,  so  that  unrea- 
soning passion  and  manifold  forms  of  criminal  seL 
fishness  have,  in  the  past  ruled,  if  they  do  not  still 
rule  human  life  and  destiny. 

As  the  world  advances  towards  the  gospel  of  the 
kingdom,  a  change  is  manifest.  The  moral  world 
now  is  far  advanced  beyond  what  it  was  at  the 
dawn  of  recorded  human  history ;  it  is  still  advan- 
cing ;  and  the  time  will  come  when  man's  higher 
nature  w^ill  hold  his  lower  in  complete  control. 
Even  now,  there  are  authentic  records  of  experi- 
ences where  the  ethereal  element,  while  yet  in  the 
flesh,  not  only  rules  the  animal  nature  but,  at  times, 
rises  to  such  a  spiritual  height  as  to  act  almost  in- 
dependently of  it,  much  as  it  will  in  the  heavenly 
world. 


TO  BECOME  UNIVERSAL.  67 

When  all  men  reach  that  state,  or  stage  in  moral 
progress  in  which  the  spiritual  body  not  only  domi- 
nates the  animal,  but,  on  the  positive  side,  rises 
into  the  light,  and  love,  and  life  of  God  its  Father, 
— then  will  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom,  as  Jesus 
saw,  and,  in  principle  proclaimed  it,  be  established 
on  earth  as  it  is  in  heaven. 

How  great  a  revolution  for  our  crazy,  suffering, 
sinful  world  such  a  change  would  be !  Glance  at 
the  best  state  of  society  that  now  exists,  which  I 
believe  to  be  the  Christian  Church,  and  how  far 
short  of  what  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom  calls  for 
and  makes  possible,  do  most  Christian  people  fall. 
If  we  turn  to  other  historical  religions  in  the 
world,  and  to  the  people  who  embrace  them,  the 
moral  distance  from  the  final  goal  appears  to  be 
yet  further  removed.  Enter  the  boundless  field  of 
business  activity,  take  careful  note  of  the  unright- 
eous practices  that  prevail,  and  of  the  selfish  mo- 
tives that  prompt  them,  and  we  see  at  once  what 
mighty  changes  must  come  over  the  business  world 
before  it  can  enter  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom.  The 
nations  of  the  earth,  past  and  present,  have  ever 
been,  and  still  are,  living  each  for  itself.  National 
history  is  largely  the  record  of  gigantic  selfishness. 
Each  is  scheming  for  some  personal  advantage; 


68  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

and  is  either  at  war,  or  preparing  for  war  against 
any  power  that  may  cross  its  track.  "What  a 
change  must  come  over  the  nations  before  they  can 
enter  the  kingdom!  It  is  needless  to  go  further 
and  dive  down  into  the  depths  of  irreligion  and  im- 
morality for  proof  that  the  world,  as  a  whole,  is 
yet  far  away  from  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom. 

But  there  is  a  brighter  side  to  this  great  subject. 
The  world,  as  we  shall  see,  is  everywhere  changing 
for  the  better.  One  evolutionary  advance,  and  this 
along  many  lines, .  succeeds  another.  Old  errors 
are  being  discarded;  new  light  beams  along  the 
world's  pathway ;  and  as  knowledge  increases  and 
human  conditions  improve,  the  hearts  of  men  are 
softening,  their  higher  natures  begin  to  rule  the 
lower,  and  so  it  will  continue  to  be,  until,  in  some 
coming  century  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom  will  be 
established  throughout  the  earth  as  it  is  in  heaven. 
It  is  the  further  purpose  of  this  chapter  to  give 
some  of  the  grounds  for  this  belief;  not  the 
methods  of  producing  the  great  result,  but  reasons 
for  believing  that  some  day  it  will  come  to  pass. 

It  has  already  been  seen  that  the  gospel  of  the 
Church  and  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom,  as  regards 
the  end  to  be  secured,  are  one  in  thought  and  pur- 
pose.    They  differ  mainly  as  to  the  nature  and  ade- 


TO  BECOME  UNIVERSAL.  69 

quacy  of  the  means  to  be  employed  in  securing  that 
purpose.  It  has  been  the  dream,  the  faith  and  the 
hope  of  the  Christian  Church  for  nearly  twenty 
centuries  that  she  may  draw  the  whole  world  to 
herself  and  to  God  ;  and  throughout  a  large  part  of 
Christendom  it  is  her  dream  to-day.  The  most 
heroic  endeavors,  costing  millions  of  lives  and 
countless  millions  of  treasure,  have  been  expended 
for  this  end.  All  Christian  denominations,  with 
commendable  energy,  are  vying  with  each  other 
for  the  accomplishment  of  this  noble  purpose ;  and 
surely  no  thoughtful  person  could  wish  to  have 
these  efforts  of  the  Churches  diminished,  although 
one  might  desire  to  see  them  sometimes,  in  part, 
differently  directed.  It  has  been  objected  that 
those  who  put  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom  into  great 
prominence  are  indifferent  to  the  interests  and 
work  of  the  Church.  This  cannot,  certainly  should 
not  be  true ;  because,  for  the  present,  and  probably 
for  a  long  time  to  come,  the  Christian  Churches  of 
the  world  must  be  the  definite  and  aggressive  force 
for  the  extension  of  the  gospel  on  earth.  The 
gospel  of  the  kingdom,  like  ships  in  the  offing,  is 
still  in  the  distance,  and  cannot  yet  be  considered 
as  the  central,  working  force  of  the  world.  The 
Churches  are  noAv  in  the  foreground.    Let  ministers 


70  THE  GOSPEL  OF  TEE  KINGDOM. 

and  people,  as  best  they  can,  work  on,  drawing 
closer  together  and  enlarging  their  views  and  oper- 
ations until,  step  by  step,  they  shall  comprehend 
the  greater  gospel  of  the  kingdom,  and  be  merged 
into  it.  So  much,  at  least,  needs  to  be  said  in  com- 
mendation of  the  Churches  and  of  the  separate  and 
responsible  place  they  hold  in  the  work  of  the 
world  for  the  coming  of  the  kingdom. 

Keturning  now  to  the  question, — Will  the  time 
ever  come  when  the  larger  gospel  of  the  kingdom, 
as  Jesus  saw  it,  will  be  established  throughout  the 
earth  as  it  is  in  heaven  ?  The  answer  must  be  an 
affirmative  one,  and,  among  others,  for  the  follow- 
ing reasons : 

1.  The  existence  of  such  a  world  as  ours  affords 
strong  presumptive  evidence  that  it  will  reach, 
somewhere  in  the  future,  a  state  of  ideal  perfection. 
God  is  back  of  everything  that  is  finite.  Whatever 
His  creative  energy  undertakes  is  for  some  great 
benevolent  purpose.  Men  appear  to  act,  at  times, 
impulsively,  and  with  no  ultimate  end  in  view; 
but  God,  never.  In  all  He  does,  God  not  only  has 
a  benevolent  purpose,  but  what  He  wills  to  do 
never  fails  of  accomplishment.  Because  men  fail 
so  often  and  so  utterly,  we  sometimes,  inconsider- 
ately it  may  be,  assume  that  some  of  God's  plans 


TO  BECOME  UNIVERSAL,  71 

may  come  to  nought.  But  such  a  thing  has  never 
taken  place  since  the  universe  began  to  exist,  and 
never  will.     God  never  fails. 

This  world  then,  was  made  for  some  great  and 
good  end.  Man,  the  noblest  of  God's  earthly  work, 
bears  the  divine  image,  and  so  must  have  some  high 
destiny.  When  we  look  back  over  the  past  and 
observe  how  sin,  sorrow  and  suffering  have  marked 
the  track  of  human  history,  it  is  not  easy  for  us  to 
find  conclusive  proof  of  God's  infinite  goodness  in 
the  creation  and  condition  of  the  human  race.  To 
find  that  proof  in  full-orbed  completeness  we  must 
take  in  the  entire  history  of  earth  and  man,  past, 
present  and  future,  and  not  view  it  in  segments. 
Could  such  a  view  be  obtained  the  character  of 
God,  at  every  period,  would  be  to  human  vision, 
more  glorious  than  is  the  sun  in  the  heavens. 

Clearly  then,  God's  plan  for  this  earth  and  its 
inhabitants,  is  not  yet  fully  unfolded.  The  earth 
itself  will  some  day,  in  the  process  of  creation,  leave 
behind  it  the  storms,  tornadoes,  earthquakes,  pesti- 
lences and  manifold  causes  of  suffering  that  have  at 
times  wrought  desolation,  and  then  will  come  in 
their  places,  from  earth  and  sky,  such  health-giving, 
life-preserving,  safety-securing  and  soul-satisfying 
provisions,  as  shall  cause  men  to  forget  past  sor- 


72  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

rows,  because  of  present  joys  and  future  pros- 
pects. 

But,  if  the  groaning  earth  is  to  be  regenerated 
and  perfected  in  the  carrying  out  of  God's  plan, 
how  much  more  must  His  benevolent  purpose  ex- 
tend to  man,  and  ensure  for  him  a  far  higher  experi- 
ence of  moral  purity,  and  of  divine  favor  than  he 
has  ever,  as  a  race,  consciously  enjoyed.  Such  a 
possibility  is  full  of  hope  and  significance.  It 
means  light  for  darkness,  liberty  for  bondage,  love 
and  life  for  hatred  and  death.  In  particular,  it 
means  the  breaking  av^ay  from  every  form  of  evil, 
whether  in  private,  social,  business,  or  national 
life;  and  a  full  entrance  into  the  gospel  of  the 
kingdom  where  God  shall  reign  supreme,  and  whose 
banner  over  the  world  shall  be  love.  This  would 
be  the  consummation  of  human  happiness,  and  the 
end  for  which  man  has  been  in  training  through 
all  the  ages.  I  repeat  that  the  earth's  existence 
and  man  upon  it  affords  presumptive  proof  that 
Christ's  kingdom,  which  means  a  Theocracy,  is  to 
become  universal. 

2.  A  glance  at  the  course  of  human  history 
brings  us  to  the  same  conclusion.  History  is  an 
account  of  the  events  and  changes  that  have  taken 
place  in  past  times,  and  of  the  causes  that  produced 


TO  BECOME  UNIVERSAL,  73 

them,  and  which  they,  in  turn,  produce.  We  have 
only  to  compare  the  world  as  it  is  to-day  with  what 
it  was  four  thousand,  or  two  thousand,  or  one 
thousand,  or  five  hundred  years  ago,  to  see  that  the 
stream  of  progress  has  been  ever  onward,  and  is 
still  moving  with  ever  increasing  momentum  towards 
the  kingdom.  The  progress  has  not  been  rapid, 
but  we  must  remember  that  the  mills  of  God  grind 
slow,  but  they  grind  exceeding  small;  and  also, 
that  one  day  with  the  Lord  is  as  a  thousand  years, 
and  a  thousand  years  as  one  day.  Granting  that 
there  have  been  eddies,  counter  currents  and  some- 
times long  stretches  of  almost  no  apparent  move- 
ment, yet,  when  we  compare  one  generation  with 
another,  and  especially,  if  this  comparison  is  ap- 
plied to  the  more  civilized  nations  of  the  earth, 
progress  upward  and  onward  is  the  one  marked 
characteristic  of  history.  We  have  only  to  glance 
at  the  savage  days  of  early  Old  Testament  times, 
and  of  all  ancient  history,  with  the  wars  of  to-day, 
— horrible  as  these  are, — or  to  review  the  bloody 
persecutions,  and  wholesale  slaughters  of  Christian 
people,  prompted,  even  in  modern  times  by  the 
Church  in  the  supposed  interests  of  religion,  and 
compare  them  with  the  spirit  and  practice  now  pre- 
vailing, to  see  that  the  world,  on  its  religious  side, 


74  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

is  passing  from  almost  blank  darkness  into  clear 
dawn,  if  not  into  broad  daylight.  Let  any  English- 
speaking  people,  or  even  half-civilized  nation,  at- 
tempt to-day  to  repeat  the  tragic  scaffold  scenes, 
or  burnings  at  the  stake,  that  were  applauded,  even 
in  England,  not  man}^  centuries  ago,  and  the  world 
would  rise  against  the  barbarity,  as  the  United 
States  rose  against  the  cruelties  of  Spain  in 
Cuba. 

All  this  clearly  indicates  that  both  Church  and 
State, — that  civilizations  indeed, — are  steadily  ad- 
vancing towards  the  kingdom ;  that  the  law  of  love 
and  the  principle  of  brotherhood  are  at  least  com- 
ing into  view,  both  in  the  Church  and  out  of  it.  It 
may  and  probably  will  be,  a  long  time  before 
Church  and  State,  before  the  religions  and  civiliza- 
tions of  the  world  will  consent  to  throw  off  their 
excrescences,  tear  down  their  useless  and  worn-out 
scaffolding  and  come  unitedly,  in  spirit  and  in  truth 
into  Christ's  gospel  of  the  kingdom.  But,  if  his- 
tory, the  greatest  of  teachers,  assures  us  of  any- 
thing yet  in  the  future,  it  points,  in  the  light  of  the 
past,  to  such  further  triumphs  of  truth  as  shall  ulti- 
mate in  the  establishment  of  a  complete  Theocracy 
over  all  the  earth,  which  is  the  natural,  normal 
government  for  man,  and  is  only  another  name  for 


TO  BECOME  UNIVERSAL,  75 

the  kingdom  that  Jesus  preached  two   thousand 
years  ago.     History  predicts  its  coming. 

3.  The  instincts  and  moral  intuitions  of  man 
assure  the  universality  of  the  kingdom.  Instinct  in 
animals  and  intuition,  added  to  instinct  in  man, 
never  deceive,  for  God  has  placed  them  there  as  an 
unfailing  guide.  Intuition  is  more  than  instinct ; 
it  is  God's  voice  in  the  soul,  telling  us  what  ought 
to  be,  and  what  must  be,  if  man  ever  comes  into 
harmony  with  himself,  with  the  universe  and  with 
God.  Something  within  us  gives  assurance  that 
the  "  best  is  yet  to  be  "  ;  and  that  the  best  is  only 
to  be  found  and  enjoyed  in  the  gospel  of  the  king- 
dom, where  all  selfishness  is  left  behind,  where  the 
law  of  brotherhood  prevails,  where  love  is  the  ru- 
ling principle,  and  God  is  worshiped  with  supreme 
adoration.  This  is  the  only  true  ideal  of  perfected 
society.  Every  human  soul  grows  weary  at  times, 
if  it  is  not  always  weary,  with  the  existing  condi- 
tion of  the  race;  man  has  better  ideals  than  are 
now  actualized,  and  he  cherishes  the  hope  that 
some  day,  and  by  means  that  he  does  not  clearly 
apprehend,  the  evils  of  the  past  and  present  may 
be  overcome,  and  the  good  that  he  longs  for,  be  at- 
tained. This  is  not  an  optimistic  view,  cherished 
by  a  few  ;  it  is  the  soul-breathing  of  the  human 


76  THE  GOSPEL  OF  TEE  KINGDOM. 

race.  The  exceptions  are  so  few,  and  so  unwortliy, 
that  they  prove  the  rule,  instead  of  breaking  it. 

Would  such  a  condition  of  things  exist,  would 
the  Creator  cause  it  to  exist,  if  the  experience 
longed  for  were  never  to  be  attained  ?  This  argu- 
ment of  longing  for  and  anticipating,  is  accepted  as 
one  of  the  foremost  evidences  of  continued  life  after 
physical  death.  If  it  has  such  weight  in  that  con- 
nection it  should  be  almost  conclusive  in  this.  The 
moral  nature  of  man  then,  its  needs,  intuitions, 
longings  and  struggles,  assure  the  universality  of 
the  kingdom. 

4.  Scripture,  prophecy  and  declaration  lead  to 
the  same  conclusion.  Prophetic  Avritings,  for  the 
most  part,  are  general  in  statement,  figurative  in 
form,  and  were  never  intended  to  have  a  strictly 
literal  fulfilment.  Keasoning  therefore  from  proph- 
ecy, is  apt  to  be  uncertain  and  unsatisfying,  except 
as  to  general  conclusions.  But  whoever  has  studied 
the  prophetic  parts  of  the  Old  Testament,  in  their 
descriptions  of  the  kingdom  of  God  as  it  is  to  be  in 
the  indefinite  distance,  cannot  fail  to  have  seen  that 
a  glorious  future  for  the  Lord's  people  and  for  the 
world  of  mankind  is,  with  ever  recurring  and  in- 
creasing interest,  set  forth  in  glowing  colors.  Take 
several  chapters  in  Isaiah,  and  the  Book  of  Zech- 


TO  BEC03IE  UNIVERSAL.  11 

ariah,  for  example,  and  we  feel  the  poetic  flow,  and 
see  the  general  import  of  the  message,  while  yet  we 
cannot  expound  the  words  as  if  they  were  a  didac- 
tive  discussion  of  the  great  subject  of  the  future 
kingdom.  The  description  is  pictorial  rather  than 
didactive,  and,  for  this  reason,  it  leaves  a  clearer 
and  deeper  impression  as  to  the  universality  and 
blessedness  of  the  kingdom  than  unpoetic  words 
could  convey. 

Were  I  to  quote  these  passages  in  full,  many 
pages  would  have  to  be  given  to  them.  It  is  better, 
therefore,  to  rely  upon  the  reader's  recollection  of 
what  has  been  described,  than  to  undertake  lengthy 
quotations.  Such  expressions  as  these  often  occur. 
Gentiles  shall  see  Thy  righteousness  and  all  kings 
Thy  glory.  Kings  shall  be  Thy  nursing  fathers  and 
queens  Thy  nursing  mothers.  No  one  shall  say  to 
another  know  ye  the  Lord,  for  they  shall  all  know 
Him,  from  the  least  to  the  greatest.  His  name 
shall  endure  forever  ;  His  name  shall  be  continued 
as  long  as  the  sun ;  and  men  shall  be  blessed  in 
Him ;  and  all  nations  shall  call  Him  blessed.  Let 
the  whole  earth  be  filled  with  His  glory.  Swords 
shall  be  beaten  into  plowshares  and  spears  into 
pruning  hooks.  Nations  shall  learn  war  no  more. 
In  the  Book  of  Daniel  we  have  the  clearest  Old  Tes- 


78  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

tament  statement  of  the  coming  kingdom :  In  the 
days  of  these  kings  shall  the  God  of  heaven  set  up  a 
kingdom  which  shall  never  be  destroyed ;  and  the 
kingdom  shall  not  be  left  to  other  people  and  it 
shall  break  in  pieces  and  consume  all  these  king- 
doms, and  it  shall  stand  forever.  Much  the  same 
is  found  in  the  second  of  Isaiah:  And  it  shall 
come  to  pass  in  the  last  days  that  the  mountain  of 
the  Lord's  house  shall  be  established  on  the  top  of 
the  mountains,  and  shall  be  exalted  above  the  hills 
and  all  nations  shall  flow  into  it. 

In  the  I^evv  Testament,  Jesus  taught  us  to  pray  : 
Thy  kingdom  come  on  earth  as  it  is  in  heaven. 
His  whole  teaching,  and  that  of  His  apostles,  was, 
that  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom  is  to  become  uni- 
versal, and  that  Christ  is  to  hold  at  least  a  millen- 
nial reign  over  all  the  earth.  The  closing  chapters 
of  Eevelation  confirm  this  view,  as  indeed  does  the 
whole  Bible. 

After  all  that  can  be  said,  our  highest  ground  of 
assurance  that  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom  will  be 
established  over  all  the  earth  centres  in  Jesus 
Christ.  The  Christ  of  God,  the  Son  of  Man,  is  the 
centre  and  soul  of  the  Christian  system.  Take  Him 
out  of  it,  and  Christianity  is  destroyed.  It  is  the 
personal  Jesus,  not  simply  as  He  was  on  earth  two 


TO  BECOME  UNIVERSAL.  79 

thousand  years  ago,  but  as  He  is  now,  a  renewing 
force  in  the  thoughts,  hearts  and  lives  of  good  men, 
that  makes  the  gospel  the  power  of  God  unto  sal- 
vation, and  insures  finally,  its  universal  acceptance. 
No  moral  power  on  earth  compares  with  that 
which  emanates  from  Jesus,  even  as  light,  heat  and 
life  emanate  from  the  sun,  flooding,  warming  and 
fructifying  the  whole  earth.  Such  a  personality 
lifted  up  is  drawing  and  will  draw  all  men  unto 
himself  and  to  God.  This  is  the  central  ground  of 
hope  for  the  universal  prevalence  of  the  gospel  of 
the  kingdom. 

It  was  the  purpose  of  this  chapter  to  emphasize, 
rather  than  elaborately  prove,  what  is  commonly 
conceded,  namely,  that  this  world  and  all  the  great 
interests  it  represents,  is  somewhere  in  the  future, 
to  part  with  its  ignorance,  and  its  selfish  schemes, 
and  to  become  intelligently  and  wholly  consecrated 
to  the  service  of  God  and  man ;  and  so,  enter  fully 
into  the  kingdom  as  Jesus  saw,  and  in  principle, 
preached  it.  In  accomplishing  this  purpose  I  have 
only  called  attention  to  the  fact  apart  by  itself, 
and  not  to  the  influences  and  agencies  by  which 
the  great  ideal  is  to  become  a  reality.  This  prac- 
tical aspect  of  the  subject  is  to  occupy  succeeding 
chapters. 


V. 


EYOLUTIOIS'  GOD'S  LAW  OF  PEOGKESS 

AND  MAN'S  ADVANCE  INTO 

THE  KINGDOM. 


Y. 

EVOLUTION  god's  LAW  OF  PROGRESS  AND 

man's  advance  into  the  kingdom. 

If  the  Almighty  has  some  fixed  and  definite 
mode,  law,  or  principle  of  order,  through  which  He 
exerts  His  creative  energy,  and  carries  forward  His 
work  in  the  universe,  then  a  clear  knowledge  of 
that  mode  and  of  how  it  operates,  must  be  of 
almost  infinite  importance  to  mankind  and  de- 
mands the  profoundest  study.  If  any  such  mode 
or  law  of  procedure  exists,  the  men  of  past  genera- 
tions have  not  discovered  it.  The  fact  that  such 
discovery  may  not  have  been  reached  is  no  proof 
against  the  reality  of  some  mode  or  system  of 
operations,  any  more  than  was  the  failure,  for 
many  thousand  years,  to  discover  the  facts  and 
principles  of  astronomy  or  of  geology,  proof  of 
their  non-existence.  Ignorance  cannot  disprove 
knowledge,  though  it  may  reject  it,  as  many 
chapters  in  human  history  clearly  reveal. 

All,  or  at  least  most  men,  believe  in  the  general 

fact  of  creation  and  progress,  while  yet  they  may 

83 


84  TEE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

have  but  the  crudest  ideas  as  to  how  such  results 
are  produced.  AVhen  the  ancients  believed  that 
the  earth  was  the  centre  of  the  universe,  and  that 
it  was  a  flat  surface  and  must  rest  on  something, 
they  could  reach  no  better  conclusion  than  that  the 
something  on  which  it  rested  was  an  elephant's 
back.  Of  course,  this  only  meant  that  they  had 
reached  the  limit  of  human  knowledge. 

"With  almost  equal  credulity,  the  generations  of 
men  have  believed  that  the  world  and  the  universe 
were  created  in  six  days,  out  of  nothing,  by  the  direct 
fiat  of  the  Almighty ;  and  that  since  the  work  was 
finished,  God  has  rested  from  all  creative  energy. 
They  have  discovered  no  central  law  or  mode  of 
creation,  through  which  the  fiat  of  the  Almighty 
operates,  and  have  not  believed  that  there  was  any 
such  law.  The  purpose  and  direct  will  of  God, 
apart  from  any  law  or  system  of  order,  is  quite 
sufiicient,  they  think,  to  account  for  all  things  that 
exist. 

In  our  times,  many  wise  men  have  come  to  be- 
lieve in  the  fact  of  progress,  even  of  creative  prog- 
ress; that  this  is  now  going  on  in  many  direc- 
tions, and  that  God  is  in  some  way  connected  with 
it,  but  how  He  is  so  connected  they  do  not  know, 
and  they  think  that  no  one  else  knows.     This  class 


EVOLUTION  GOD'S  LAW  OF  PEOQBESS.  85 

of  people  are  especially  opposed  to  what,  of  late, 
has  been  called  the  doctrine  of  evolution,  because 
in  their  view  it  contradicts  Scripture  and  degrades 
man.  On  the  same  grounds,  nearly  all  great  ad- 
vances in  science  have  been  charged  with  contra- 
dicting Scripture,  robbing  God,  degrading  man  and 
doing  violence  to  religion;  but,  in  the  end,  true 
science  has  always  prevailed  over  ignorance. 

Evolution  and  progress  are  not  interchangeable 
terms.  Evolution  lies  back  of  progress  and  is  ex- 
planatory of  the  mode  or  way  by  which  real  prog- 
ress is  secured.  Evolution  necessitates  progress 
much  as  cause  does  effect.  Apart  from  evolution, 
there  is  no  abiding  progress.  What  is  this  so  much 
talked  of  and  disputed  thing  called  evolution  ? 

Before  answering  this  question  a  word  of  ex- 
planation may  be  allowable.  It  is  the  purpose  of 
the  writer,  in  all  these  chapters,  to  give  in  brief 
and  definite  form  his  own  views,  to  avoid  learned 
quotations,  or  hiding  for  protection  behind  great 
names.  If  these  studies  and  their  conclusions  com- 
mend themselves  to  the  judgment  and  moral  sense 
of  those  who  may  read  them,  the  writer  will  be 
pleased  ;  and  if  what  is  written  fails  in  its  effort  to 
secure  such  approval,  he  will  be  almost  equally 
pleased  to  have  them  rejected,  in  the  hope  that 


86  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

something  better  may  be  substituted  in  their  place. 
Only  truth  is  enduring  and  sacred. 

What  then,  does  evolution,  as  God's  method  of 
creation  and  advance  in  this  world  and  beyond, 
signify  ?  To  start  with,  I  have  no  theory  to  offer, 
but  some  great  facts  are  constantly  in  evidence  that 
appear  to  involve  a  theory  of  creation  and  progress 
that  explains  the  movements  of  this  world  and 
beyond,  so  far  as  we  apprehend  them. 

One  great  fact  that  seems  unmistakable  and  un- 
deniable, and  which  enters  largely  into  this  study 
is,  that  everything  in  nature, — man  included, — is 
ever  struggling  with  its  environment ;  and  that  its 
growth  and  progress,  or  the  opposite,  is  largely 
conditional  upon  that  struggle.  Every  spire  of 
grass,  every  leaf  on  every  tree,  every  blossom,  every 
fruit  on  the  bough  and  every  seed  in  the  ground, 
has  to  struggle  with  its  environment ;  in  other 
words,  has  to  fight  for  existence,  otherwise  it  will 
be  crowded  out  and  killed.  The  stronger  survive 
and  the  weaker  die  ;  and  in  this  way  progress  from 
lower  to  higher  forms  of  life  is  secured.  I  know 
of  no  exceptions  to  this  universal  law.  Every 
insect  and  microbe,  even  if  microscopic,  every  fish 
in  the  sea,  every  bird  in  the  air,  every  beast  in  the 
field  or  forest,  has  to  struggle  with  environment 


EVOLUTION  GOD'S  LA  W  OF  PROGRESS.  87 

for  life,  or  die  ;  and  with  the  weaker  individuals, 
struggle  is  often  unavailing. 

Man  is  no  exception  to  a  law  that  is  universal. 
Whether  we  study  man  as  an  individual,  or  in  his 
family  and  social  relations,  or  as  a  literary  and  pro- 
fessional character,  or  as  to  his  political,  civil  and 
religious  life,  or  in  any  other  set  of  human  rela- 
tions, constant  struggle  with  environment  is  the 
condition  of  success.  Men  w^ho  drift,  without 
struggling,  amount  to  nothing.  When  tiuir.:! 
ceases,  men  remain  stationary  for  a  short  tiuiL 
then  fall  backward  and  die.  This  is  not  theory, 
but  actual  experiunce  as  found  in  every  department 
of  human  history  and  of  world  life. 

The  very  earth  on  which  we  live  w^as  brought 
into  being,  and  into  its  present  condition,  through 
long  and  almost  infinite  struggle  with  environment, 
both  from  within  and  from  without ;  so  that  Paul's 
great  declaration  that  the  whole  creation  has 
groaned  in  travail  and  pain  until  now,  is  literally 
true  of  this  earth,  and  is  probably  true  of  every 
celestial  globe.  God  creates  and  secures  onward 
movement  everywhere,  not  by  direct  fiat,  but 
through  one  vast  system  of  order  which  we  call 
law  ;  and  the  fundamental  fact  in  that  system  is 
struggle  with   environment.     This   appears   to   be 


88  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGD03L 

and  must  be  the  eternal  law  of  nature,  as  God  has 
established  it,  and  it  is  of  universal  application. 
We  know  it  to  be  so  in  man's  wide  field  of  ex- 
perience. 

It  has  come  to  be  a  fixed  conclusion  in  science 
that  any  law  or  principle  that  applies  in  one  de- 
partment or  sphere  in  nature,  applies  universally  ; 
so  that  if  we  know  how  God  creates  and  pushes  the 
world  forward  in  one  department,  we  have  discov- 
ered His  method  in  every  other.  The  universe  is 
unified ;  all  are  but  parts  of  one  stupendous  whole. 
The  conclusion  then^  at  which  we  arrive,  is  this : 
That  struggle  with  environment  is  the  one  funda- 
mental condition  of  all  life,  growth  and  progress. 
And  this  law  of  creation  and  advance,  which  is  the 
right  hand  of  the  Almighty,  is  what  is,  or  should 
be,  chiefly  meant  by  the  term  evolution. 

There  is  however,  another  aspect  to  this  great 
question  of  evolution  that  calls  for  brief  attention. 
Some  who  are  prepared  to  admit  the  doctrine  in 
general,  as  it  has  been  here  stated,  hesitate  when  it 
is  claimed  that  the  struggle  upward,  as  described, 
often  involves  higher  forms  of  life  proceeding  from 
lower  ones ;  such,  for  example,  as  a  definite  species 
emanating  from  some  simple  variety,  or  some  new 
genus  coming  up  from  a  lower  species ;  that  this 


EVOLUTION  GOD'S  LAW  OF  PEOGEESS,  89 

process  may  go  on  from  less  to  greater  until,  at 
last,  man  in  this  way,  appears  on  the  earth.  It  is 
claimed,  but  by  some  denied,  that  all  life  has  ad- 
vanced from  what  appears  to  be  a  common  germ ; 
and  all,  through  this  universal  struggle  with  en- 
vironment. 

Facts  fully  attested  prove  that  this  general  view, 
at  some  points,  is  clearly  established.  At  others, 
we  must  wait  for  further  investigation  and  develop- 
ment. But,  because  the  evolutionary  theory  is  not 
absolutely  proven  at  every  point,  we  are  not,  as 
some  do,  to  refuse  acceptance  so  far  as  proof  is  con- 
clusive. What  we  do  know  with  certainty  renders 
other  conclusions  along  the  same  line  exceedingly 
probable.  They  cannot  be  denied  while  yet  they 
are  not  fully  established.  As  we  have  seen,  God's 
methods  are  uniform ;  and  what  we  know  to  be 
true  in  one  department,  we  must  anticipate  as  prob- 
ably true  in  every  other.  Only  proof  to  the  con- 
trary can  weaken  that  probability. 

Another  class  of  people  have  a  still  different  view 
of  this  doctrine  of  evolution.  With  some  qualifi- 
cation perhaps,  they  concede  that  evolution  holds 
good  as  to  the  physical  world.  They  see,  in  the 
vegetable  and  animal  kingdoms,  including  the  phys- 
ical nature   of  man,    that  struggle   with   environ- 


90  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

ment  is  the  condition  of  continued  life  and  higher 
development.  But  thej  do  not  see  that  this  same 
law  is  applicable  to  man's  moral  and  spiritual  na- 
ture. His  spirit,  they  say,  is  a  direct  emanation 
from  God,  and  that  only  direct  divine  influences  can 
sustain  and  develop  it.  If  this  were  so,  is  not  the 
law  of  evolution  as  much  a  divine  agency  as  any 
other  of  which  we  have  knowledge  ?  A  moment's 
thought  should  convince  any  one  that  evolution  is  as 
applicable  to  moral  and  spiritual  life  as  it  is  to  life 
in  any  of  its  lower  forms. 

The  spirit  of  a  man  is  as  much  an  entity,  a  form, 
a  real  existence,  as  is  the  body.  The  body  is  the 
house  in  which  the  spirit  lives,  and  which  the  spirit 
formed,  as  the  mollusk  forms  the  shell  for  its  own 
habitation.  The  shell  does  not  form  the  mollusk, 
nor  the  body  the  spirit,  but  the  opposite.  The 
spirit  then,  no  less  than  the  body,  may  be  subject 
to  the  law  of  evolution.  This  not  only  may  be 
true,  but  as  a  matter  of  experience,  it  is  so.  Edu- 
cation of  the  intellect,  as  every  child  knov»rs,  means 
toil  and  struggle  in  the  schoolroom  and  out  of  it, 
for  a  long  term  of  years.  There  is  no  royal  road 
to  learning.  We  must  work  for  it,  or  live  and  die 
in  ignorance.  As  to  ethical  and  spiritual  life,  is  it 
not  substantially  the  same  ?    Are  we  not  always 


EVOLUTION  GOD'S  LAW  OF  PEOGEESS.  91 

struggling  with  ourselves,  the  lower  nature  against 
the  higher  and  the  higher  against  the  lower,  each 
striving  for  the  mastery  ?  In  the  spiritual  realm  it 
is  the  same. 

How  hard  is  it  for  man  to  break  away  from  him- 
self and  to  find  God  in  Christ,  and  in  Him  eternal 
life !  How  many  make  the  effort,  but  the  struggle 
is  too  great  for  them,  and  they  fail.  And  many 
who  succeed  for  a  time  are  afterwards,  through  the 
power  of  temptation  from  within  and  from  with- 
out, drawn  back  to  the  world  and  its  selfish  ways. 
Spiritual  life,  even  when  it  advances  heavenward, 
is,  as  all  experience  shows,  a  continuous  struggle 
with  environment.  The  strong  succeed,  the  weak 
fail.  There  is  no  exception  to  this  law  of  struggle 
except  in  part,  when  one  becomes  so  dead  to  him- 
self, so  filled  with  the  Spirit  and  so  conscious  of 
God,  that  the  world  and  the  flesh  have  lost  powder 
over  him  ;  and  even  then,  he  must  be  ever  watchful 
and  take  heed  lest  he  fall.  If  these  things  are 
so,  then  the  law  of  evolution,  which  means  life 
and  growth  through  struggle  with  environment, 
applies  to  man's  ethical  and  moral  nature,  even  as 
it  does  to  his  physical.  Indeed,  this  law  of  evo- 
lution, or  struggle  w^ith  environment,  as  the  means 
of  preserving  life,  and  of  coming  up  to  a  higher  and 


92  TEE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

better  life,  is  the  underlying  law  of  God's  universe. 
It  is  the  law  of  all  worlds  and  of  heaven,  as  it  is  of 
earth. 

And  yet,  from  some  quarters  the  objection  returns 
that  true  religion  is  a  supernatural  thing  and  is  ex- 
ceptional; that  while  it  involves  human  freedom 
and  responsibility,  God  still  is  the  direct  author  and 
finisher  of  our  faith.  And  it  is  claimed  further, 
that  the  doctrine  of  evolution  makes  religion  the 
product  of  natural  law  and  not  of  supernatural 
grace;  it  makes  it  the  work  of  man  and  not  of 
God.  If  the  objection  is  well  taken,  it  is  fatal ;  if 
not,  it  is  groundless.  What  are  the  facts?  God, 
so  far  as  we  can  see,  and  for  all  that  man  knows,  or 
can  know  to  the  contrary,  works  universally  through 
some  great  system  of  order  that  we  call  law ;  and 
that  His  spiritual  working,  though  in  a  different 
sphere  and  by  different  agencies,  is  as  actually  in  ac- 
cord with  general  law  as  are  His  operations  in  the 
physical  world.  When  the  heart  of  any  man  is  in 
a  right  attitude  towards  truth  and  God,  the  Holy 
Spirit  comes  to  that  soul  and  leads  it  into  life  and 
peace  as  naturally,  and  as  much  in  conformity  with 
eternal  law,  as  when  the  rain  and  sunshine  fall  on 
the  parched  and  seeded  earth  and  bring  forth  first, 
the  blade,  then  the  ear,  and  then  the  full  corn  in 


EVOLUTION  GOD'S  LAW  OF  PEOGBESS.  93 

the  ear,  not  miraculously,  but  in  conformity  with 
natural  law.  And  that  law,  alike  in  each  case,  is 
God's  law  of  evolution  ;  that  is  to  say,  it  is  struggle 
with  environment,  which,  when  rightly  conducted, 
secures  Divine  cooperation.  Keligion  is  no  more 
supernatural,  and  apart  from  the  divinely  appointed 
order  of  nature,  as  the  Almighty  has  established  it, 
than  is  the  growth  of  vegetation,  the  coming  and 
going  of  animal  life,  or  the  birth  and  death  of  man. 
The  great  system  of  God's  appointment,  which 
wise  men  have  come  to  call  evolution,  as  an  efficient 
and  secondary  cause,  is  back  of  them  all.  God 
works  ever  through  this  system  and  not  otherwise, 
as  the  facts  of  observation  and  experience  clearly 
reveal. 

What,  I  am  asked,  is  the  purpose  of  bringing  this 
doctrine  of  evolution  into  the  general  study  of  the 
kingdom  as  Jesus  comprehended  it  ?  The  question 
is  a  fair  one  and  demands  an  answer. 

We  have  seen  that  evolution  means  creation  and 
progress.  It  is  God's  method  of  uplift  and  advance 
from  lower  to  higher  conditions,  and  this  through 
struggle  with  environment  on  the  part  of  whatever 
is  to  be  new-created.  God's  law  of  evolution  oper- 
ates in  the  sphere  of  mind  and  of  religion  no  less 
than  in  the  vegetable  and  animal  kingdoms ;  and  it 


94  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

is  in  the  department  of  ethical  and  spiritual  life 
and  growth  that  its  place  and  importance  in  this 
study  of  the  kingdom  clearly  appears.  If  religious 
life,  through  struggle  with  environment,  is  to  be 
advanced  until  the  Church  and  the  world  are 
merged  in  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom, — as  the  pre- 
ceding chapter  claims, — then,  it  is  of  the  highest 
moment  that  we  understand,  as  far  as  knowledge  is 
now  possible,  the  pathways  and  stages  along  which 
the  Church  and  world  must  travel  and  struggle 
from  the  place  where  they  now  are,  on  to  their 
final  and  glorious  destination  in  the  kingdom.  That 
journey  will  be  a  "  hard  road  to  travel,"  otherwise 
it  would  not  be  God's  evolutionary  and  creative 
method.  Advance  towards  the  kingdom  is  as 
actually  a  form  of  new  creation  as  is  the  making  of 
stellar  worlds,  but  in  another  sphere  of  creative 
energy.  The  process  may  be  slow  and  difficult 
but,  at  length,  when  the  goal  is  reached,  it  will  be 
without  violence  and  will  come  as  naturally  and 
joyously  as  does  the  rising  sun,  or  the  leaf-bursting 
and  genial  springtime,  or,  as  does  the  prepared 
soul's  translation  into  glory. 

In  the  six  succeeding  chapters  I  propose  to  trace 
the  evolutionary  lines  along  which  the  Church  and 
world  must  travel,  and  the  process  of  struggle  with 


EVOLUTION  GOD'S  LAW  OF  PROGRESS.  95 

environment  they  must  pass  through  on  their  long 
journey  towards  and  into  the  gospel  of  the  king- 
dom. This  purpose,  added  to  foregoing  sugges- 
tions, explains  why  the  law  of  evolution  is  given  so 
large  a  place  in  so  small  a  volume  on  a  great  sub- 
ject. Evolution  is  the  key  to  what  follows ;  it  un- 
locks the  world's  history,  and  is  the  working  prin- 
ciple in  the  whole  creative  and  struggling  move- 
ment of  the  moral  world  away  from  self  and  up  to 
God. 

Let  us  not  complain  that  God's  plan  of  creation 
and  progress,  especially  for  man,  means  so  much  of 
opportunity  and  difficulty,  of  struggle  and  hard- 
ship, of  encouragement  and  disappointment,  of  pain 
and  pleasure,  of  success  and  failure  ;  and  that  these 
experiences  are  ever  alternating  each  other  from 
the  beginning  to  the  end  of  every  mortal  life. 

Let  us  rather  consider  that  all  these  and  similar 
experiences,  are  necessary  to  our  social,  intellectual 
and  moral  advancement, — that  they  are  rounds  in 
the  ladder  by  means  of  which  we  climb  up  to 
heaven  and  to  God,  and  without  which  such  climb- 
ing would  be  impossible.  All  deep  thinkers  on  the 
mystery  of  human  life  recognize  these  experiences, 
and  welcome  them  as  optimistic  facts,  and  as  the 
only  rational  pathway  to  a  glorious  hereafter.     The 


96  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

two  Brownings  make  this  view  of  life,  as  do  other 
poets,  the  chief  burden  of  their  song ;  and  surely  it 
is  God's  w^ay  of  leading  the  world  into  the  gospel 
of  the  kingdom.  When  John,  the  Kevelator,  asked 
of  the  angel,  "Who  are  these  ten  thousand  times  ten 
thousand  robed  in  white?  He  answered, — These 
are  they  who  have  come  up  through  great  tribula- 
tion. In  this  way  only  can  we  become  white-robed. 
This  has  been  the  experience  of  good  men  and 
women  in  every  age  of  the  world,  and  will  continue 
to  be  down  to  the  end  of  human  history  and  be- 
yond. It  relates  to  individuals  and  organizations 
alike.  In  heaven  as  on  earth  there  w^ill  be  intel- 
lectual and  spiritual  advancement ;  this  process  will 
go  on  endlessly  without  reaching  finality,  and  the 
law  of  progress,  there  as  here,  w^ill  be  struggle  with 
environment.  Such  a  law  should  have  a  large  place 
in  our  thoughts,  plans,  ideals,  and  purposes  of  life. 


VI. 

THE  TWENTIETH  CEKTIJEY  CEISIS  AND 
THE  KINGDOM. 


VL 


THE      TWENTIETH      CENTUKY      CRISIS     AND     THE 
KINGDOM. 

The  evolutionary  work  of  the  Almighty,  often 
through  long  stages,  appears  to  go  on,  if  it  moves 
at  all,  by  the  silent  operation  of  some  unseen  law ; 
while  yet  in  every  department  of  nature  there 
come,  at  set  times,  more  or  less  distant,  periods  of 
crisis,  of  transition,  and  even  of  revolution,  that 
terminate  in  some  new  order  of  life. 

Our  physical  globe  appears  to  have  passed 
through  many  such  changes,  as  its  mountain  ranges 
and  volcanic  eruptions,  its  deep  sea-soundings  and 
shore-changes,  its  glacial  periods,  and  great  climatic 
variations  and  other  seismic  movements  clearly 
reveal.  In  vegetable  and  animal  life  on  the  earth's 
surface  the  same  law  of  uniform  movement,  ter- 
minating in  crises  periods,  has  evidently  prevailed, 
as  fossil  remains  of  now  extinct  plants  and  animals 
of    different    species   and   classes,   one   succeeding 

another,  give  positive  assurance, 

99 


100  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

In  human  history  there  have  been  comparatively 
long  reaches  of  apparent  uniformity,  of  silent,  often 
undiscovered  growth  and  preparation  for  some  sud- 
den evolutionary  transition,  that  was  the  natural 
result  of  inherent  causes,  unobserved  by  the  many, 
till  the  crisis  was  upon  them.     The  briefest  outline 
of  human  records,  ancient  and  modern,  would  con- 
firm this  view.     A  glance  at  the  most  ancient  na- 
tions, as  we  know  them,  chiefly  from  long-buried 
but  now  discovered  records,  tells  of  their  many 
years  of  prosperity,  then  of  their  failure  to  advance 
and,  finally,  of  their  consequent  and  sudden  over- 
throw.    The  great  crisis  that  came  to  the  Hebrew 
people,  and  to  the  Eoman  nation,  when  Jesus,  the 
Christ  of  God  appeared  and  for  which  the  world 
had  long  been  in  a  course  of  preparation,  strikingly 
illustrates  the  general  course  of  history.     The  Kef- 
ormation  of  the  sixteenth  century  shows  that,  for  a 
long  period,  an  almost  apostate  Church,  by  refusing 
to  "  keep  step  with  God,"  had  prepared  herself  for 
the  great  crisis  that  rent  her  asunder,  established 
Protestantism,  and  opened  a  new  door  of  hope  for 
the  world.     Almost  every  century  has  furnished 
some   illustration,  general   or   local,  of   protracted 
preparation  for  coming  events  and  then,  of  sudden 
shocks  through  which  those   events,  for  good    or 


THE  TWENTIETH  CENTURY  CRISIS.  101 

evil,  have  changed  the  current  of  local  or  of  general 
history. 

The  whole  world  is  to-day  in  the  throe  of  a 
greater  evolutionary  transition  than  has  marked 
any  other  period  in  history.  It  is  more  general, 
deeper  rooted,  more  sacred,  far-reaching  and  uplift- 
ing than  have  been  any,  or  many  united,  of  its  nu- 
merous predecessors.  Many  people  do  not  see  this, 
and  if  they  did,  they  would  do  their  utmost  to  pre- 
vent its  advance.  Yain  attempt !  As  well  might 
they  undertake  to  sweep  back  the  ocean  tides  with 
a  broom,  or  to  roll  back  the  tide  of  time,  as  to  op- 
pose successfully  the  mighty  crisis  for  which  the 
world  has  long  been  preparing  and  which  is,  even 
now  upon  us,  and  is  sure  to  increase  and  sweep  on- 
ward till  its  great  and  solemn  mission  is  accom- 
plished !  What  the  end  will  be,  so  far  as  this  gen- 
eration is  concerned,  will  depend  largely  upon  the 
generation  itself.  God  is  back  of  all  and  our  re- 
ward w411  be  according  to  our  works. 

Great  changes  must  come,  almost  revolutionary 
changes  ;  and  if  they  are  accepted  as  God  offers 
them,  there  is  reason  to  hope  that  at  no  very  dis- 
tant day  the  whole  world  will  be  drawn  into  the 
gospel  of  the  kingdom.  Of  course,  there  will  be 
set-backs  and  hindrances.     Selfishness  will  every- 


102  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

where  assert  itself  and  struggle  for  supremacy. 
Outworn  systems,  methods  and  forms  will  die  hard. 
Conservatism  will  resist;  but,  if  those  who  have 
eyes  to  see,  use  them  wisely  and  move  on  as  God 
leads  the  way,  with  confidence  and  courage,  those 
grand  results  for  which  the  world  has  been  so  long 
preparing,  as  many  begin  to  see,  will,  in  time,  be 
successfully  accomplished. 

The  fact  to  be  emphasized  is,  that  the  world  is 
entering  into  a  great  evolutionary  crisis,  one  in 
which  good  and  evil,  right  and  wrong,  God  and 
mammon  stand  face  to  face.  Those  who  do  not 
see  this,  or  who  deny  it,  are  blind. 

The  nineteenth  century  has  been,  on  the  whole, 
the  greatest  in  human  history.  The  twentieth  cen- 
tury will  be  as  much  greater  than  the  nineteenth  as 
that  has  been  greater  than  any  of  its  predecessors, 
if  possibly,  the  first  be  an  exception.  The  great 
work  of  the  last  century  has  been  largely  prepara- 
tory. It  has  been  the  discovery  and  discussion  of 
new  aspects  of  truth,  of  principles  and  of  revised 
ideals,  as  they  relate  to  God,  and  especially  to  man 
with  his  fellow-man.  General  principles  are  now 
largely  settled,  and  it  will  be  the  province  of  the 
twentieth  century,  if  possible,  to  reduce  these  prin- 
ciples to  practice,  so  that  the  right  shall  prevail  and 


THE  TWENTIETH  CENTURY  CRISIS.  103 

society,  in  all  its  parts,  be  harmonized  with  the  law 
of  love  which  is  the  central  law  of  the  moral  uni- 
verse and  so  of  Christ's  kingdom. 

The  coming  struggle,  here  called  a  crisis,  means, 
as  the  word  signifies,  separation  that  leads  to  a  new 
order  of  things  ;  and  the  change  may  be  sudden,  or 
of  prolonged  duration.  The  term  crisis  is  here  used 
because  no  other  single  word  seems  to  describe  ex- 
isting conditions  so  well ;  and  it  is  used  in  a  some- 
what limited  sense  to  describe  changes  rather  than 
the  space  of  time  to  be  occupied  in  producing  them. 

In  stating  some  of  the  foremost  issues  that  must 
enter  into  the  struggle  or  crisis  of  the  twentieth 
century,  I  shall  simply  and  in  a  few  words  give  the 
points  in  controversy,  without  discussing  them  or 
expressing  an  opinion.  Discussion  and  settlement 
are  not  my  work ;  it  is  that  of  the  twentieth  century. 
But  something  is  gained  for  the  kingdom  by  having 
clearly  in  view  the  issues,  often  interblended,  that 
must  be  rightly  disposed  of  before  the  gospel  of  the 
kingdom  can  come  on  earth  as  it  is  in  heaven. 

Many  of  the  disturbing  questions  of  to-day,  that 
may  bring  on  a  crisis,  are  sociological ;  and  this  is 
comparatively  a  new  field  of  study  that  lies  much 
in  the  mist  of  uncertain tv.  When  leading  writers 
upon  it  can  agree  in  their   principles,  and  when 


104  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

sociology  becomes  a  science,  it  may  be  that  some 
knotty  questions  will  find  an  easier  solution  than 
now  seems  probable. 

Some  perplexing  questions  for  the  twentieth  cen- 
tury to  dispose  of  are  the  following : — I  shall  num- 
ber them  for  the  sake  of  convenience. 

1.  The  inalienable  rights  of  man  and  of  labor. 
All  men  are  not  created  equal  as  to  heredity, 
natural  ability,  or  environment.  But  all  men  have 
an  inalienable  right  to  life  and  liberty,  if  these 
rights  have  not  been  forfeited  by  crime.  The  poor 
and  the  rich  have  their  respective  rights  ;  but  when 
we  attempt  to  define  and  differentiate  them,  opin- 
ions clash.  The  two  classes  meet  together  and  are 
mutually  dependent,  so  that  neither  can  prosper 
without  the  other.  The  wage-earner  is  entitled  to 
a  just  reward  for  his  labor ;  but  who  is  to  decide 
what  constitutes  that  just  reward  ?  The  rich  man 
is  apt  to  say  that  the  law  of  supply  and  demand 
must  settle  it ;  but  this  is  denied.  Then  the  rich 
claim  that  the  poor  have  no  good  ground  for  com- 
plaint, since  they  are  better  paid,  housed,  fed  and 
educated  than  they  were  a  hundred  years  ago. 
The  poor  man's  reply  is  that,  if  wages  have  in- 
creased, so  has  the  necessary  cost  of  living ;  and 
that  the  laborer's  condition  relatively  to  that  of  his 


THE  TWENTIETH  CENTURY  CRISIS.  105 

employer,  is  not  better,  but  worse,  than  it  was 
many  years  ago ;  and  also,  that  the  employer  be- 
comes rich  from  the  earnings  of  the  laborer,  while 
he  gets  as  his  reward,  only  enough  to  keep  himself 
and  family  in  existence,  and  that  this  state  of 
things  is  a  violation  of  the  inalienable  rights  of 
man.  So  the  two  parties  accuse  and  condemn  each 
other.  One  claims  that  the  other  has  no  need  to 
be  poor,  and  that  if  he  is  so,  it  is  his  own  fault. 
The  other  retorts  that  the  rich  man  becomes  rich 
by  oppressing  the  poor,  and  that  in  such  a  world  as 
this,  of  want  and  woe,  no  man  has  a  right  to  be 
rich ;  that,  instead  of  hoarding  his  wealth,  he 
should  share  it  with  the  poor  and  needy  who  are  as 
good  as  he.  This  central  point  of  controversy  is 
for  the  twentieth  century  rightly  to  adjust. 

2.  Combination  of  capital.  Once,  there  was 
very  little  of  what  we  call  capital  to  combine  ; 
now,  it  has  increased  a  thousandfold,  and  a  large 
part  of  it  is  in  the  hands  of  a  few  individuals,  or  of 
corporations.  Wealth  is,  to-day,  being  combined 
in  great  trusts,  under  different  names ;  and  it  looks 
as  if  in  a  short  time,  these  trusts  would  own  and 
control  the  world.  Have  such  combinations  a  right 
to  exist,  and  if  so,  under  what  conditions  and  for 
what  ends  ?     Those  in  the  "  combines  "  have  their 


106  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

grounds  of  defense  which  they  deem  unanswerable. 
Their  opponents  claim  that  trusts  exist  for  three 
selfish  reasons :  1.  To  control  the  price  of  labor. 
2.  To  control  the  whole  class  of  business  that 
enters  into  the  trust,  and  3.  To  sell  their  goods  at 
as  high  rates  as  the  people  will  endure ; — all  selfish 
reasons.  This  vital  and  knott}'-  question  of  trusts 
the  near  future  must  adjust,  if  there  is  to  be  peace 
in  the  land. 

3.  Combinations  of  labor.  It  is,  perhaps,  not 
unnatural  that  when  capital  combines  against 
labor  that  labor  should,  in  turn,  combine  against 
capital.  Accordingly  we  find  wage-earners,  espe- 
cially in  factories  and  mining  fields,  organizing 
unions  and  great  societies,  under  different  names, 
evidently  to  counteract  the  supposed  intentions  of 
their  employers.  They,  too,  have,  it  is  said,  three 
ends  in  view:  1.  To  compel  employers  to  pay 
satisfactory  wages.  2.  To  dictate  to  monied  cor- 
porations whom  they  may  and  may  not  employ, 
and  3.  To  prevent  wage-earners  of  their  own 
crafts  from  getting  work  unless  they  consent  to 
join  their  unions.  This  is  a  serious  condition  of 
things.  Two  powerful  and  closely  related  organi- 
zations stand  almost  in  battle  array  against  each 
other.     Adjustment  must  come  or  the  cord  that 


THE  TWENTIETH  CENTURY  CRISIS.  107 

binds  them  together   will   be   broken,   and   what 
then ! 

4.  Strikes  and  strikers.  Corporations  claim  that 
they  have  a  right  to  employ  whom  they  will;  and 
laborers  claim  the  right  to  strike  or  quit  work 
when,  for  any  reason,  they  are  dissatisfied.  And 
union  strikers  not  only  refuse  to  work  themselves, 
but  refuse  to  allow  other  workmen  to  take  the 
places  that  they  vacate.  These  rights  are  claimed 
and  denied.  Who  shall  surrender,  and  on  what 
conditions  ?  is  a  vital  question  for  the  near  future 
to  decide. 

5.  Wealth  and  poverty.  Wealth  is  power  and 
poverty  is  weakness,  except  when  roused  to  mad- 
ness. The  rich  charge  the  poor  with  shiftlessness, 
laziness  and  the  spending  of  their  wage-earnings 
foolishly,  as  the  cause  of  their  poverty.  A  large 
class  of  the  poor  claim  that  the  rich  are  bound  to 
share  their  substance  with  the  needy  and  especially, 
with  honest  workmen  whose  muscle,  they  say, 
creates  the  wealth  of  the  world.  What  do  justice 
and  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom  demand  ? 

6.  Money  and  righteousness.  This  is  a  ma- 
terialistic age.  Money  getting  is  the  craze  of  our 
day.  It  is  said  that  a  large  part  of  the  business  of 
the   world  is   virtually   gambling,  or   some   other 


108  TEE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

form  of  overreaching  dishonesty ;  and  that  this 
state  of  things  is  not  only  unrighteous,  but  is 
becoming  intolerable.  How  shall  men,  it  is  asked, 
be  induced,  or  compelled,  if  necessary,  to  observe, 
in  business  transactions,  the  golden  rule  of  Christ's 
kingdom  ?  Is  money  to  be  considered  the  highest 
good?  And  shall  its  acquisition,  as  in  many 
quarters  it  now  seems  to  be,  constitute  the  chief  end 
of  life?  This  is  a  question  for  the  twentieth 
century  to  settle,  not  as  an  intellectual  speculation 
but  as  a  fact  of  experience.  Shall  practice  and 
principle  harmonize  or  converge  ? 

7.  Franchises  and  government  ownership. 
There  seems  to  exist,  in  many  quarters,  evidence  of 
a  disposition,  on  a  gigantic  scale,  to  get  something 
for  nothing.  Corporations  ask  for  great  privileges, 
— trolley  roads  and  franchises  are  examples, — from 
city,  state,  or  nation,  gratis,  on  the  ground  that 
their  enterprises  will  benefit  the  people ;  while,  it 
is  claimed  that  their  real  motive  is  to  get  possession 
of  the  people's  property  to  enrich  themselves ;  and 
that  this  involves  both  deception  and  injustice. 
And  besides,  it  is  claimed  that  the  people,  and  not 
speculators,  should  ovv^n  and  operate  most  of  our 
internal  improvements,  in  the  interests  of  the 
public.     Here  is  a  great  problem  for  the  twentieth 


TEE  TWENTIETH  CENTURY  CRISIS.  109 

century  to  solve  and  it  is  not  likely  to  be  of  easy 
solution. 

8.  Marriage  and  divorce.  The  family  institution 
is  as  old  as  the  human  race.  It  underlies  both 
Church  and  State,  and  without  it  neither  religion 
nor  government  could  exist.  Marriage  is  the  family 
bond,  and  whoever  undervalues  or  breaks  that  bond 
without  sufficient  cause,  is  the  enemy  of  mankind. 
The  institution  of  marriage  is  in  peril,  as  any  one 
who  reads  the  daily  papers  or  takes  note  of  divorce 
statistics,  must  clearly  see.  Opinions  are  divided 
on  this  vital  subject.  Some  hold  that  divorce  is 
never  allowable,  except  for  one  crime.  Others 
name  from  one  to  a  dozen  grounds  on  which  divorce 
is  allowable.  Where,  between  husband  and  wife, 
love  and  respect  have  changed  to  unreconcilable 
hatred,  some  would  have  the  parties  divorced  as 
the  less  of  two  evils  ;  others  would  compel  them  to 
live  together  so  long  as  life  endures.  This  whole 
question  of  marriage  and  divorce,  so  vital  to  hu- 
manity, must  have  fresh  thought  and  readjustment. 

9.  Eeligion,  theology,  the  Church  and  the  king- 
dom. Every  observing  and  thoughtful  person  must 
see  that  religion,  to-day,  is  in  a  critical,  disturbed 
and  transitional  condition  ;  not  that  true  religion  is 
in   any  more  danger  of  being  driven  out  of  the 


110  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

world  than  light,  air  and  life  are  in  such  danger. 
The  danger  consists  in  mistaking  the  nature  of 
true  religion.  To  the  question,  What  is  religion  ? 
different  answers  are  given.  One  class  makes  re- 
ligion, all  true  religion,  to  consist  in  love, — love  of 
God  and  love  of  man,  worship  of  God  and  service 
of  man,  and  in  this  alone.  Another  larger  and 
conservative  class  confuses  religion  with  theology, 
with  creeds,  with  traditions,  with  Church  member- 
ship, and  with  rites  and  forms.  These  two  con- 
ceptions are  as  wide  apart  as  possible.  One  gives  a 
sound  basis  for  Christian  unity ;  the  other  lays  the 
foundation  for  denominational  and  sectarian  di- 
vision and  strife.  One  puts  religion  in  the  heart 
and  makes  it  a  life ;  the  other  puts  religion  in  the 
intellect  and  makes  it  a  belief,  a  dogma.  One  view 
belongs  to  the  gospel  of  the  Church ;  the  other,  to 
that  of  the  kingdom.  The  question,  What  is  the 
true  and  vital  religion  that  must  everywhere  be 
insisted  upon,  and  what  are  other  things,  which, 
though  important  are  not  the  genuine  article  nor 
essential  to  it,  must  be  met  and  settled,  if  the 
Church  is  to  hold  her  historic  position  and  move  on 
into  the  kingdom.  The  crisis  is  here  and  must  be 
met. 

10.     The  nature  and  end  of  civil  government.     In 


THE  TWENTIETH  CENTURY  CRISIS.  Ill 

the  present  state  of  the  world,  it  is  conceded,  that 
civil  government  is  a  necessity  and  is  ordained  of 
God.  But  for  what  end  or  purpose  should  govern- 
ments exist  and  be  administered  ?  This  is  a  divi- 
sive question.  A  majority  of  rulers  appear  to  think 
that  governments  exist  for  themselves  and  for  their 
own  enrichment  and  glorification ;  while  their  sub- 
jects begin  to  feel  that  they  should  exist  for  the 
good  of  the  people,  and  for  that  end  only.  This 
distinction  is  radical  and  one  side  or  the  other  must, 
in  the  coming  crisis,  be  victorious. 

Another  point  in  civil  government  that  demands 
adjustment,  is  this  :  Should  government  be  an  abso- 
lute monarchy,  as  in  Russia,  or  a  limited  and  con- 
stitutional monarchy,  as  in  England,  or  a  republic, 
as  in  the  United  States  ?  On  one  point  there  is 
certainty,  namely :  That  the  drift  of  the  civilized 
world  is  towards  a  form  of  government  that  shall 
be  of  the  people,  by  the  people  and  for  the  people. 
The  drift  is  towards  larger  liberty.  These  govern- 
mental questions  cannot  be  settled  hastily,  and  may 
await  evolutionary  and  educational  developments ; 
but  they  cannot  be  long  delayed. 

11.  Politics,  as  a  trade.  It  is  claimed  that  the 
great  majority  of  politicians  make  politics  a  trade 
or  profession,  and  that  they  serve  their  country  for 


112  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

personal  and  party  ends,  and  not  for  their  country's 
good.  Political  bosses  and  those  who  serve  under 
them,  it  is  said,  control  legislation  and  secure  civil 
appointments  much  as  if  they  owned  the  govern- 
ment, and  were  running  it  for  what  they  can  get 
out  of  it.  Their  motto  is :  "  To  the  victors  belong 
the  spoils."  Of  course,  there  are  genuine  states- 
men ;  but  if  half  of  what  is  charged  against  profes- 
sional politicians  be  true,  here  is  a  crying  and  peri- 
lous crime, — a  nest  of  vipers, — that  the  twentieth 
century  must  attack  and  destroy.  Politics  must  not 
be  a  sham.     Is  it,  or  is  not  so  now  ? 

12.  The  negro  question.  This  nation  has 
about  eight  millions  of  negroes.  Slavery  is  abol- 
ished, and  the  black  man,  by  law  is,  at  the  polls, 
the  peer  of  his  white  neighbor.  And  yet,  the  black 
man  is  almost  everywhere  ostracized.  While  chat- 
tel slavery  is  abolished,  shall  state  laws  be  allowed 
to  hold  him  in  ignorance  and  practical  bondage? 
What  shall  be  done  with  the  negro,  and  what  is  to 
be  his  future  condition  in  this  land  ?  is  one  of  the 
gravest  questions  of  the  coming  crisis  that  must  be 
studied  and  settled  on  principles  of  right  and  jus- 
tice. 

13.  International  war.  War  and  especially, 
international  war,  in  past  ages,  was  the  business  of 


THE  TWENTIETH  CENTURY  CBISIS.  113 

the  world,  or  rather,  of  kings  and  rulers.  By  one 
class  wars  are  applauded  and  soldiers  are  patriots 
of  the  highest  order.  Another  class  holds  that  war 
is  barbarous,  that  it  is  the  tax  and  burden  of  the 
world  ;  that  it  is  needless,  and  that  civilized  nations 
should  put  their  ban  upon  it  and  settle  international 
disputes  in  courts  of  arbitration. 

And  yet,  if  we  look  abroad,  we  find  every  nation 
raising  and  equipping  great  armies,  building  war 
ships  and  forts,  inventing  guns  and  engines  of  de- 
struction, and  exhausting  their  resources  in  prepara- 
tion for  war.  Never  in  the  world's  history,  it  is 
said,  were  the  nations  doing  so  much  in  the  work 
of  preparation  for  war  as  they  are  to-day.  What, 
it  is  asked,  can  all  this  signify,  if  it  does  not  mean, 
somewhere  in  the  twentieth  century,  such  an  awful 
international  war  as  history  has  never  witnessed  ? 
The  war-crisis  is  here ;  compromises  will  not  settle 
it ;  and  it  is  for  this  generation  to  find  and  apply 
some  principle  of  righteousness  that  shall  expel  the 
spirit  and  practice  of  war  from  the  world  and  make 
its  ravages  never  again  possible. 

This  long  list  of  critical  situations  might  be 
longer ;  and  the  question  now  arises :  How  is  the 
twentieth  century  to  deal  with  them?  Different 
lines  of  action  may  be  taken. 


114  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

One  possibility  would  be  for  the  century  to  shut 
its  eyes  to  existing  facts,  and  to  ignore,  belittle,  or 
deny  them,  asserting  that  no  unusual  condition  of 
things  exists  and  that  it  is  safe  and  best  to  let 
events  take  their  course  and,  by  evolutionary  proc- 
ess work  out  results.  If  men  were  irrational  be- 
ings and  cowards  in  addition,  such  a  course  might 
be  excusable,  but  not  otherwise.  Doubtless,  some 
of  the  many  issues  stated  in  this  chapter  are  less 
urgent  and  more  easily  disposed  of  than  others ; 
but  most  of  them  demand  earnest  thought  and 
prompt  endeavor,  if  clashing  crisis  is  to  be  avoided. 

Another  way  of  meeting  the  coming  crisis  is  to 
attempt  settlement  by  means  of  compromises. 
Compromise  has  been  the  American  method  of 
settling  differences.  It  was  so  with  the  demands  of 
slavery;  and  this  plan  is  being  adopted  now,  in 
connection  with  strikes  and  their  causes.  Indeed, 
in  all  directions,  men  seek  to  compromise ;  and,  to 
a  certain  extent  it  is  proper  to  do  so.  But  com- 
promises are  never  a  finality.  They  only  postpone 
the  real  issue.  They  are  only  make-shifts  for  the 
hour.  Jesus  never  proposed  compromise,  nor  does 
the  gospel  of  the  kingdom  on  questions  of  right  and 
wrong. 

Still  another  mode  of  meeting  issues  is,  for  wise 


THE  TWENTIETH  CENTURY  CRISIS.  115 

men  to  study  thoroughly,  scientifically  and  without 
prejudice,  the  questions  at  issue,  and  to  continue 
this  investigation  until  the  right  and  the  wrong 
that  are  in  them  come  clearly  into  view  and  stand 
over  against  each  other;  then,  let  a  square  and 
firm  position  be  taken  and  maintained  for  the  right 
and  against  the  wrong,  and  let  the  moral  and  in- 
tellectual struggle  go  on,  without  compromise,  till 
right,  justice  and  truth  are  established  in  the  earth. 
This  is  the  manly  and  Godlike  way  of  procedure. 

But  suppose  that  all  these  and  other  pacific  meas- 
ures fail,  then,  finally,  will  come  violence  and  the 
*'  tug  of  war."  Should  such  a  dire  calamity  befall 
the  century  let  the  wrong,  the  selfish,  the  unworthy^ 
and  those  alone,  be  the  attacking  party.  In  such 
a  struggle  the  right  would  surely  win  and  the  crisis 
come  to  a  glorious  termination  for  the  gospel  of  the 
kingdom.  But  my  hope  is,  and  it  is  a  confident 
hope,  that  the  great  crises  of  the  twentieth  century 
will  be  settled  by  reason  and  not  by  violence. 

It  is  by  evolutionary  movements  like  these,  often 
slow  in  preparation,  and  then,  when  the  ripened 
time  of  crisis  arrives,  rapid  in  action,  that  the  world 
is  being  freed  from  darkness  and  bondage,  and 
slowly  but  surely  led  into  the  light  and  liberty  of 
the  gospel  of  the  kingdom.     Any  attempt  to  antici- 


116  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

pate  and  force  the  natural  order  of  events  may  lead 
to  failure ;  but  when,  in  the  providence  of  God,  the 
time  for  action  has  come,  as  I  believe  it  now  has, 
let  the  sons  and  daughters  of  the  kingdom  know 
that  this  is  their  day  of  opportunity,  and  the  har- 
jrest  time  for  the  fruitage  of  the  kingdom.  Should 
the  twentieth  century,  in  this  critical  hour,  falter 
and  fail,  it  may  soon,  in  reproof,  hear  a  voice  from 
heaven  speaking  to  it,  in  the  words  of  Mordecai  to 
Esther,  at  the  opening  of  a  great  Hebrew  crisis. 
"  If  thou  altogether  boldest  thy  peace  at  this  time, 
then  shall  there  enlargement  and  deliverance  arise 
from  another  place."  If  the  twentieth  century  is 
not  equal  to  the  demand,  then  the  twenty -first  must 
take  up  its  work  and  so  on  to  the  end;  for,  as 
surely  as  time  endures,  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom 
must  be  established  on  earth  as  it  is  in  heaven ;  and 
this  by  the  combination  of  human  and  Divine 
agency. 


YII. 

A  TRUE  KNOWLEDGE  OF  GOD  THE  OPEN 
DOOEWAY  INTO  THE  KINGDOM. 


YII. 

A  TRUE  KNOWLEDGE  OF  GOD  THE  OPEN  DOORWAY 
INTO  THE  KINGDOM. 

It  is  said  of  Daniel  Webster,  (whether  the  story 
is  literally  accurate  does  not  matter)  that  once, 
when  dining  with  a  company  of  distinguished  men, 
one  of  the  party  asked  this  question;  "Mr. Web- 
ster, what  of  all  the  great  subjects  that  have  oc- 
cupied your  thoughts,  and  on  which  you  have 
spoken,  do  you  consider  the  greatest  ?  "  anticipa- 
ting, no  doubt,  that  he  would  reply  that  his  great- 
est theme  was  the  Constitution  of  the  United 
States,  and  that  his  greatest  speech  was  his  reply  to 
Mr.  Haine  of  South  Carolina.  The  man  was  mis- 
taken. Mr.  Webster  paused  a  moment  in  silence, 
and  then  answered:  "The  greatest  subject  that 
ever  occupied  my  mind  is  the  thought  of  Almighty 
God  and  the  relation  we  sustain  to  Him  and  He 
sustains  to  us."  A  greater  and  nobler  reply  never 
fell  from  mortal  lips. 

The  world  of  mankind  has  many  needs,  small 

and  great ;  but  the  profoundest  of  them  all  is  the 

119 


120  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGD03L 

need  of  a  true,  experimental  knowledge  of  God. 
Such  knowledge  is,  itself,  eternal  life.  It  is 
written  :  This  is  life  eternal  that  they  might  know 
the  only  true  God  and  Jesus  Christ  whom  Thou 
hast  sent. 

The  human  soul  is  full  of  restlessness,  of  longing 

.  ,  and  of  rush  after  something,  it  knows  not  what ; 

:.y^  but  something  that  it  does  not  possess.  All  history 
is  but  a  record  of  the  world's  struggles  for  the  un- 
known, yes,  at  bottom,  for  the  unknown  God. 
The  Athenians  built  an  altar  to  this  unknown 
God  and  worshiped  Him  as  one  afar  off  and  a 
stranger,  though  He  was  not  far  from  any  one  of 
them.  All  the  religions  of  the  world,  the  highest 
and  the  lowest,  are  a  search  after  God.  ISTot  re- 
ligious people  alone,  but  the  irreligious,  the  worldly, 
the  wicked  and  even  sensualists,  are  in  search  of 
something  that  can  satisfy;  and  only  the  infinite 
satisfies.  Often  they  know  not  what  they  w^ant, 
but  they  do  know  that  they  want  something  not 
yet  possessed. 

Unbelievers,  skeptics  and  agnostics  are  no  ex- 
ception. They  try  to  solve  the  mysteries  of  life. 
God's  infinity  and  the  vastness  of  His  evolutionary 
operations  bewilder  and  create  uncertainty,  so  that 
doubt  and  unbelief  are  not  unnatural.   Honest  denial, 


A  TRUE  KNOWLEDGE  OF  GOD.  121 

with  earnestness  of  purpose  may  be  more  acceptable 
to  God,  and  more  helpful  to  men  than  thoughtless, 
traditional  faith  that  leads  only  to  formality,  pro- 
fession and  perfunctory  service  can  be.  Character 
resides  in  the  hearts  of  men,  and  if  the  heart  is  set 
on  finding  the  truth,  it  is  then  following,  unwisely 
it  may  be,  after  God,  and  so  far  is  accepted  of  Him. 
My  point  is  that  all  men,  the  good  and  bad  alike, 
are  reaching  out  in  different  ways  after  the  supreme 
good,  and  they  will  possess  it  when  they  come  to 
find  and  know  the  only  living  and  true  God. 

Of  course,  no  finite  being,  in  this  world  or  in  any 
other,  can  have  a  complete  or  perfect  knowledge  of 
the  infinite  God.  Only  infinity  can  perfectly  com- 
prehend the  infinite.  And  yet,  the  processes  of 
evolution  are  continually  bringing  God  more  and 
more  within  the  comprehension  of  men,  and  so 
within  the  range  of  personal  experience.  Some  of 
the  processes  by  which  we  approach  God  and  gain 
such  knowledge  of  Him  as  leads  into  the  gospel  of 
the  kingdom  are  the  following : 

1.  Pure  reason,  in  the  department  of  metaphys' 
ical  philosophy,  leads  to  some  vague  conception  of 
God.  It  gives  us  the  universal  law  of  causality, 
and  traces  that  law  back  to  the  first  cause,  which 
it  affirms  must  be  eternal,  infinite  and  absolute. 


122  TEE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

Reason  reaches  a  conception  of  the  infinite,  partly 
from  the  study  of  the  finite  and  the  not  finite,  and 
partly  infinity  of  space  and  duration  suggests  the 
idea  of  causal  infinity.  Eeason  afiirms  alike  the 
necessity  and  the  incomprehensibility  of  a  first 
cause.  "Whether  that  first  cause  is  a  personality, 
endowed  with  intellectual  and  moral  attributes,  or, 
whether  it  be  simply  force,  or,  at  most,  some  power 
in  the  universe  that  makes  for  righteousness,  reason 
alone  can  neither  aflirm  nor  deny.  Little  as  this 
may  seem,  it  is  something  to  know  that  whatever 
is  finite,  is  not  self-existent,  but  has  back  of  it  an 
infinite  cause.  And  it  would  seem  to  be  self-evident 
that  finite  nature  cannot  be  self-originated,  since 
potentiality  can  never  become  actuality,  except  as 
it  is  produced  by  a  cause  back  of  itself.  If  strict 
Pantheism  is  an  absurdity,  then  there  must  be  an 
infinite,  absolute  Being  back  of  what  we  call  na- 
ture, from  whom  all  movements  proceed.  We  have 
then,  here,  a  philosophic  foundation  that  necessi- 
tates and  partly  discloses,  God  as  infinite  and  su- 
preme. 

2.  Traditional  and  authoritative  testimony  con- 
cerning God  does  something,  and  with  many  much, 
towards  revealing  God  and  leading  into  the  gospel 
of  the  kingdom.     A  traditionary  belief  in  God,  and 


A  TBUE  KNOWLEDGE  OF  QOD.  123 

of  religion  as  being  the  worship  and  service  of  God, 
has  been  handed  down  through  all  the  ages.  This 
belief  has  been  taught  in  homes  and  in  Sun- 
day-schools to  children,  has  been  formulated  in 
creeds,  printed  in  books  and  preached  everywhere 
from  the  pulpit.  As  a  natural  and  necessary  result, 
most  people  in  Christian  lands  believe  in  God  and 
in  the  Christian  religion.  This,  certainly,  is  a  vast 
gain  over  what  would  exist  had  such  teaching  been 
entirely  withheld. 

Still,  the  great  fact  must  not  be  overlooked  that 
a  belief  in  God  and  in  religion  from  personal  con- 
viction and  experience,  is  one  thing,  and  that  a  be- 
lief in  what  others  think  and  say  about  Him  is 
often  quite  another.  One  is  a  first-hand  and  the 
other  a  second-hand  faith.  One  is  a  personal  faith, 
an  experience  of  God,  the  other  is  a  belief  in  what 
others  say  about  Him;  a  second-hand  traditional 
faith  that  great  multitudes  possess  without  being  at 
heart.  Christians  at  all.  Such  a  faith  leads  often  to 
profession,  to  formality,  to  perfunctory  service.  It 
often  makes  people  sectarians,  zealots  for  doctrine, 
bigots  in  their  treatment  of  others,  heresy-hunters 
and  most  uncharitable  towards  all  who  differ  from 
themselves. 

Or,  a  second-hand  faith  may  lead  to  utter  indif- 


124  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

ference.  The  Pharisees  in  Christ's  day  are  good 
illustrations  of  a  traditionary  faith.  Authority  is 
largely  the  bond  by  which  the  Eoman  Catholic 
Church  is  held  together.  It  is  this  second-hand 
traditional  faith  that  sustains  and  perpetuates  Mo- 
hammedanism and  that  accounts  for  the  tenacity 
with  which  Buddhists  cling  to  Buddhism.  While 
its  value  to  Christianity  is  not  denied,  still,  the  re- 
ligion that  Jesus  taught  and  that  man  needs  is  per- 
sonal experience,  and  not  formal  second-hand 
assent ;  it  is  a  thing  of  the  heart  more  than  of  the 
head  ;  it  is  life  and  peace  and  not  cold  acceptance 
of  what  others  believe  and  teach. 

3.  If  we  would  find  and  know  God  truly,  we 
must  begin  by  seeking  Him  in  ourselves.  Man  is 
created  in  God's  image.  Not  as  to  character,  but 
as  to  attributes,  he  is  configured  to  the  Almighty, 
not  in  degree,  but  in  kind.  If  this  be  so,  then  God 
is  mirrored  in  ourselves,  and  in  ourselves  we  must 
find  His  reflection.  I  do  not  speak  of  form,  but  of 
spirit.  What  I  am  in  a  limited  finite  sense,  God  is 
in  an  unlimited  and  absolute  sense.  If  I  find  in 
myself  the  power  of  thought  and  rationality,  even 
in  a  low  degree,  I  know  that  God,  my  Maker,  must 
possess  this  power  in  infinite  perfection.  If  I  find 
myself  possessed  of  will  power,  I  must  infer  that 


A  TRUE  KNOWLEDGE  OF  GOD,  125 

God,  who  imparted  this  to  me,  has  the  same  power 
in  unlimited  measure.  If  I  find  myself  in  the  pos- 
session of  moral  faculties,  of  conscience,  of  a  sense 
of  right  and  wrong  and  of  clear  convictions  of 
responsibility  and  of  duty,  then  I  know  that  these 
gifts  came  from  God,  and  that  He  has  the  same  in 
infinite  proportions  ;  for  what  God  has  in  any  de- 
gree. He  must  possess  in  an  infinite  degree.  Hu- 
man intuitions  must  be  the  reflex  of  divine  intui- 
tions. 

It  is  no  contradiction  of  terms  to  say  that  we 
must  find  God  in  ourselves,  and  then  to  add  that 
we  must  find  ourselves  in  God.  Only  as  we  know 
God,  do  we  really  know  ourselves ;  for  in  God  alone 
do  we  come  to  realize  our  privileges,  possibilities 
and  final  destiny.  This  seeking  to  find  God  in  our- 
selves and  ourselves  in  God,  is  not  a  new  idea,  but 
it  is  a  mine  of  precious  truth  that  has  been  more 
worked  of  late  than  ever  before.  The  deeper 
we  delve  into  it,  the  richer  is  the  reward.  And 
when  we  come  to  find  God  as  fully  outlined  in  our- 
selves, and  ourselves  as  fully  revealed  in  the  light 
of  God,  then  we  shall  have  an  open  door  into  the 
gospel  of  the  kingdom.  This  is  the  need  and  privi- 
lege of  the  whole  human  race. 

4.     God  is  revealed  to  men  still  further  in  the 


126  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGD03L 

realm  of  physical  nature,  if  only  we  have  eyes  to  see 
and  hearts  to  feel  the  great  revealing.  It  is  largely 
through  the  imagination  and  not  by  logical  process, 
that  Ave  find  God  in  His  works.  Whether  we  study 
God  in  the  minute  atom,  so  infinitesimal  that  the 
best  microscope  can  hardly  reveal  it,  and  yet,  that 
may  contain  potentialities  that  make  and  mould 
living  beings  on  the  face  of  the  earth  ;  or  whether 
we  study  Him  in  the  acorn  that  contains  the  spread- 
ing oak  in  embryo,  or  whether  we  study  Him  in 
the  starry  heavens  deep  and  infinite,  "  ever  singing 
as  they  shine,  the  hand  that  made  us  is  divine,"  or 
whether  we  study  Him  as  He  reveals  Himself  in 
human  hearts  and  lives, — in  whatever  way  we  pene- 
trate the  archives  of  nature, — Ave  find  ourselves 
standing  face  to  face  with  God  ;  and  Ave  feel  His 
inspiration  and  His  uplifting  poAver.  H  "  An  unde- 
vout  astronomer  is  mad,"  equally  so  is  the  man  who 
can  look  upon  the  leafy  and  flowery  outbursts  of 
springtime,  or  upon  the  glorious  wealth  of  autumn 
and  not  have  his  soul  attuned  to  the  spirit  of  lofty 
praise  and  adoring  Avorship. 

Until  of  late,  and  in  some  quarters  until  now, 
this  finding  God  in  the  realm  of  nature,  "  in  rocks 
and  rills,  in  lakes  and  hills,"  has  been  depreciated 
and  distrusted  as  inimical  to  the  Bible,  the  creeds 


A  TRUE  KNOWLEDGE  OF  GOD.  127 

and  the  pulpit,  and  as  conducive  to  sentimental  and 
feeble  Christian  liie.  Thoughtful  men  are  begin- 
ning to  see  that,  indeed  and  in  truth, — The  heav^ens 
declare  the  glory  of  God  and  the  firmament  show- 
eth  His  handiwork;  that  day  unto  day  uttereth 
speech,  and  night  unto  night  showeth  knowledge ; 
that  their  line  has  gone  out  through  all  the  earth 
and  their  words  to  the  end  of  the  world. 

6.  This  brings  us  to  a  fifth  and  closely  related 
avenue  through  which  God  may  be  seen  and  known. 
It  is  the  avenue  of  Divine  Immanence.  In  some 
general  dogmatic  sense,  the  idea  of  the  omnipres- 
ence of  God  has  been  accepted  ;  but  the  modern 
conception  of  Divine  Immanence  carries  a  new  and 
larger  meaning.  The  old  thought  was  that  God  is 
seated  some^vhere  in  the  heavens,  on  a  great  w^hite 
throne  from  which,  in  some  mysterious  way.  He 
regulates  and  controls  the  affairs  of  the  universe. 
That  conception  is  now  enlarged  and  has  had 
breathed  into  it  the  spirit  of  life. 

The  finite  universe  is  an  emanation  from  God. 
It  is  not  independent  and  self-existent ;  nor  is  tiio 
finite  and  natural  created  out  of  nothing.  Such  a 
thing  is  unthinkable.  From  nothing,  nothing 
comes.  There  is  something  of  God  in  everything 
that  exists ;  in  the  solid  earth  and  in  every  living 


128  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

thing  on  its  surface,  there  God  is.  ISTature  is  not 
God,  but  God  is  in,  through,  above  and  beneath  all 
that  we  call  nature.  Evolution  is  creation ;  it  is 
God  revealing  Himself  in  His  works.  God  is  in 
everything  that  we  see,  hear  and  think  about,  in 
every  storm  and  wind  and  wave,  in  every  star  that 
studs  the  hea^vens,  in  every  plant,  tree,  and  flower 
that  grows  on  earth,  in  every  animal  and,  most  of 
all,  in  man  who  bears  His  own  image.  This  is  not 
Pantheism,  because  all  emanations  or  created  things 
are  finite,  and  God  is  infinite  and  is  infinitely  more 
and  be^^ond  all  that  emanates  from  Him. 

This  conception  of  God  brings  Him  near  to  us. 
In  Him  we  do  indeed  live  and  move  and  have  our 
being.  He  is  as  near  to  us  as  we  are  to  ourselves. 
To  realize  all  this  as  a  truth  of  experience  is  a  long 
step  towards  finding  and  knowing  God  and  is  a 
doorway  into  the  kingdom. 

6.  If  God  is  revealed  to  men  in  nature  He  is 
much  more  fully  revealed  in  Jesus  Christ  who  is 
God  manifest  in  the  flesh.  Jesus  Christ  revealed 
the  moral  character  of  God,  the  heart  of  God,  His 
fatherhood.  His  love  His  mercy  and  the  brotherhood 
of  man,  as  they  had  never  been  revealed  before. 
God  was  in  Christ,  reconciling  the  world  unto  Him- 
self.    To  know  Christ  is  to  know  God.    These  now 


A  TRUE  KNOWLEDGE  OF  GOD.  129 

familiar  truths  are  the  highest  and  fullest  revela- 
tioDs  that  God  has  made  of  Himself  to  men ;  and 
they  could  only  be  made  through  one  who  person- 
ates and  represents  Himself.  How  do  we  find  God 
in  and  through  Christ  ? 

There  are  three  ways  in  which  one  rational  being 
can  be  truly  found  and  known  of  another.  How, 
for  example,  might  one  have  known,  in  the  fullest 
sense  of  that  term,  such  a  man  as  Abraham  Lin- 
coln ?  1.  By  listening  to  what  those  who  knew 
him  well  had  to  testify  in  his  behalf  and  by  read- 
ing what  had  been  written  about  him.  2.  By 
reading  what  he  himself  may  have  spoken  and 
written  as  expressive  of  his  own  thoughts  on  great 
subjects.  3.  By  enjoying  the  opportunity  of  intimate 
personal  acquaintance  and  a  lifelong  friendship. 

In  all  these  ways  we  may  know  Jesus  Christ  and 
Sis  and  our  Father  whom  He  personated  and  per- 
fectly represented.  Thousands  upon  thousands  of 
the  living  and  the  dead  bear  testimony  concerning 
Jesus  and  God  in  Him,  that  is  full  of  divine  and 
blessed  revelation.  Then,  the  words  that  Jesus 
spoke  and  the  things  that  He  did  while  on  earth, 
lead  us  more  and  more  into  a  knowledge  of  the 
heart  and  purpose  of  God.  JSTow,  if  we  can  add  to 
all  this  an   intimate   personal  acquaintance   with 


130  TEE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

Christ  and  with  God  in  and  through  Eim,  as  many 
do,  it  would  seem  that  such  knowledge  must  be 
almost  complete.  In  these  three  ways  what  multi- 
tudes of  people  have  found  God  and  been  led  into 
the  gospel  of  the  kingdom  ! 

Y.  And  yet,  God  is  to  be  found  in  another,  a 
deeper  and  more  experimental  way  than  any  of  the 
preceding  indicates.  We  may  become  as  personally 
conscious  of  God  as  we  are  of  ourselves  and  of  the 
objects  that  surround  us.  Consciousness  is  a  knowl- 
edge of  one's  own  states  and  experiences.  It  is  not 
interior  experience  only,  but  knowledge  and  ex- 
perience of  things  exterior  to  ourselves  that  come 
within  the  radius  of  consciousness.  We  may  then 
become  conscious  of  God  in  whom  we  live  and 
move  and  have  our  being.  Jesus  was  conscious  of 
God  as  He  was  of  Himself  when  He  said :  "  I  and 
My  Father  are  one.  He  that  hath  seen  Me  hath 
seen  the  Father."  And  in  His  prayer  that  His 
followers  might  be  one  in  Him,  and  He  in  them,  as 
He  and  the  Father  were  one,  showed  that  it  was 
possible  for  His  disciples  to  be  conscious  of  God, 
even  as  He  was  conscious.  When  Paul  says:  I 
live,  yet  not  I,  but  Christ  liveth  in  me ;  and,  again, 
For  me  to  live  is  Christ, — he  must  have  had  an  ex- 
perience, a  consciousness  of  God  even  as  he  had  of 


A  TRUE  KNOWLEDGE  OF  GOD.  131 

himself.  He  had  attained  to  such  an  inter-dwelling 
with  God,  his  purpose  and  life  were  so  merged  in 
the  divine  purpose  and  life  that  they  seemed  to  be 
one,  and  they  fell  equally  within  the  field  of  con- 
sciousness. In  his  prayers  he  talked  with  God  as 
friend  talks  with  friend,  and  with  the  same  con- 
sciousness of  a  double  presence.  This  experience  of 
God-consciousness  is  not  something  that  one  can 
communicate  to  another.  Each  must  know  it  for 
himself,  or  he  cannot  know  it  at  all.  "  "What  man 
knoweth  the  things  of  a  man  save  the  spirit  of  man 
which  is  in  him.  Man  possesses  a  double  nature, 
consisting  of  body  and  spirit.  The  spiritual  or 
ethereal  body  is  our  real  self,  and,  at  times,  spirit 
rises  so  above  material  things  as  to  see  and  feel  the 
invisible,  to  see  and  know  God,  and  divine  things, 
almost  as  they  are  seen  and  known  in  the  ethe- 
realized  world.  The  least  that  can  be  said  is  that 
such  an  experience  is  soul-satisfying,  and  is  itself 
eternal  life.     It  is  being  in  the  kingdom. 

8.  How  may  this  state  of  God-consciousness  be 
attained  and  perpetuated  ?  I  answer,  it  is  the  fruit 
of  the  Spirit  who  takes  the  things  of  Christ  and 
reveals  them  unto  us.  The  dispensation  of  the 
Spirit  is  the  greatest  of  all  dispensations,  because  it 
is  more  spiritual  than  any  other.     It  brings  the 


132  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

heart  of  man  into  direct,  unveiled  contact  with  the 
heart  of  God ;  it  brings  to  him  clear  vision  and 
lofty  inspiration,  and  enables  him,  in  the  full  con- 
sciousness of  the  Divine  presence  to  exclaim,  Abba 
Father. 

But  there  are  conditions  upon  which  this  inter- 
communication and  consciousness  of  God  may  come 
into  human  lives.  What  are  these  conditions  ?  It 
comes,  so  far  as  man  is  concerned,  of  a  longing 
desire  to  find  and  know  God,  and  of  utter  self -sur- 
render to  Him.  No  partial  surrender,  with  mental 
and  conscious  reservations,  no  mere  intellectual 
assent  avails  anything.  There  must  be  universal, 
unconditional  surrender,  including  all  one  has,  is, 
and  hopes  to  be  in  this  life  and  beyond,  as  the 
price  of  securing  consciously  the  witness  of  the 
spirit.  In  such  a  surrender  the  Holy  Spirit  comes 
to  us  with  wonderful  revelations  of  God's  presence, 
pouring  such  measures  of  divine  light,  love  and  life 
into  our  souls  as  satisfy  every  conscious  want.  All 
doubt  vanishes,  the  heart  is  filled  with  satisfying 
peace  and  great  joy.  Such  ones  come  into  the 
Holy  of  holies  where  they  are  as  conscious  of 
God  as  they  are  of  themselves.  They  now  un- 
derstand and  have  entered  into  the  gospel  of  the 
kingdom. 


A  TRUE  KNOWLEDGE  OF  GOD.  133 

Enough,  I  hope,  has  been  said,  in  illustrating  so 
briefly  these  eight  ways  of  finding  God,  to  show- 
that  a  true  knowledge  of  God  is  possible,  and  that 
it  constitutes  man's  greatest  need,  and  is  the  open 
doorway  into  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom.  Count- 
less thousands  have  entered  Christ's  kingdom  along 
this  avenue,  and  have  finished  their  course  and  re- 
ceived their  crown.  Great  multitudes  now  living, 
of  all  lands  and  of  all  religions,  are  seeking  and 
finding  God.  Many  have  already  found  Him,  and 
others  are  pressing  on,  often  with  obscured  vision, 
but  with  inspiring  hope,  after  a  true  knowledge  of 
the  living  God.  This  great  experience  is  broaden- 
ing throughout  the  world.  ]N"ever  was  there  such 
a  search  after  God  by  so  many  people  throughout 
the  earth  and  of  all  ranks  and  conditions  in  life,  as 
there  are  to-day.  This  is  a  great  and  hopeful  omen. 
Every  one  who  finds  the  prize  draws  others  after 
him.  The  time  must  come  when  the  whole  world, 
in  a  broad  and  liberal  sense  will  know  God  and 
Jesus  Christ  whom  He  hath  sent,  and  this  knowl- 
edge is  eternal  life.  This  day  will  come  through 
evolutionary  struggle  with  environment  in  the 
moral  and  spiritual  world.  It  may  be  long  in 
coming,  but  the  end  is  sure,  for  God  is  back  of  all, 
and  in  all,  and  His  plan  and  purpose  never  part. 


134  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

God  is  not  a  failure.  When  it  comes,  evil  will  fly 
away  and  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom  will  be  estab- 
lished on  earth  as  it  is  in  heaven.  God  speed  the 
day! 


YIII. 

KELIGIOIJS  AND  CHUECH  AGENCIES  THAT 
LEAD  INTO  THE  KINGDOM. 


YIII. 

KELIGIOUS    AND    CHURCH    AGENCIES   THAT   LEAD 
INTO   THE   KINGDOM. 

The  world  is  full  of  agencies  that  work  directly 
or  indii^ectly  for  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom.  One 
class  of  these  agencies  is  professedly  religious  and 
belongs  largely  to  the  Christian  Church.  Another 
class  makes  no  such  profession,  Avhile  yet  it  is 
working  for  the  kingdom.  This  chapter  Avill  be 
occupied  with  agencies  of  the  professedly  religious 
order. 

And  first  of  all,  what  is  religion?  Keligion  is 
truth  vitalized.  All  truth  is  religious,  and  all  relig- 
ion is  living  truth ;  not  truth  in  the  abstract,  but 
truth  as  a  vital  principle  in  the  hearts  and  lives  of 
men.  Truth  and  religion  are  inseparable,  and  are 
unified  in  God,  who  is  the  source  and  sum  of  all 
living  truth  and  of  all  true  religion.  The  heart  of 
living  truth  is  love,  and  God  is  love,  and  love  is 
Godj  and  this  because  love  is  life,  is  purity,  is  holi- 
ness, justice,  mercy  and  truth  combined.  Religion 
then,  is  the  joint  product  of  truth  and  love,  not 

137 


138  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

either  apart,  but  the  two  combined  in  human  hearts 
and  lives.  Such  religion  not  only  leads  towards 
the  gospel  of  the  kingdom,  but  it  is  that  kingdom 
in  its  fulness  and  power.  When  the  living  truth 
of  love  comes  into  the  hearts  of  all  men,  then 
Christ's  kingdom  will  have  come  on  earth  as  it  is 
in  heaven. 

This  is  religion  from  an  intellectual  point  of 
view.  Practically  considered,  religion  finds  its  best 
illustration  in  the  life  of  Jesus. 

The  Old  Testament  prediction  of  the  Messiah 
and  of  His  mission,  as  quoted  by  Jesus  in  the  Syna- 
gogue at  JSTazareth  is  in  these  words :  He  hath  sent 
Me  to  heal  the  broken-hearted,  to  preach  deliver- 
ance to  the  captive  and  recovering  of  sight  to  the 
blind,  to  set  at  liberty  them  that  are  bruised,  to 
preach  the  acceptable  year  of  the  Lord.  This  was 
practical  religion.  It  was  Christ's  mission,  and 
how  faithfully  He  fulfilled  it.  From  first  to  last 
His  sympathies  were  with  the  poor,  the  weak,  the 
afflicted,  the  sorrowful,  the  neglected,  the  dis- 
couraged and  the  wronged.  He  went  about  doing 
good  and  this  was  literally  the  work  of  His  life. 

Jesus  emphasized  the  duty  of  repentance,  and 
the  need  of  turning  from  all  selfishness  to  a  life  of 
benevolence  and  well-doing.     He  proclaimed  great 


RELIGIOUS  AND  CHURCH  AGENCIES.  139 

principles  of  truth  and  righteousness,  and  declared 
that  true  freedom  comes  through  a  practical  knowl- 
edge of  the  truth.  And  yet  He  placed  practical 
duties  above  intellectual  theories.  He  taught,  and 
insisted  upon,  the  most  rigid  of  ethical  systems, 
and  especially,  that  every  man  should  love  his 
neighbor  as  he  loved  himself.  Love  from  the 
heart,  expressed  in  life,  was  the  sum  of  Jesus' 
religion,  and  it  is  the  religion  of  the  kingdom. 

In  the  light  of  this  standard  we  may  study  that 
class  of  agencies  for  the  kingdom  that  is  called 
religious,  and  that  centres  largely  in  the  Christian 
Church.  The  Church  herself  is  the  foremost  of 
these  agencies,  and  claims  our  first  attention.  We 
have  already  seen  that  the  Church  is  less  than  the 
kingdom ;  we  have  also  seen  what  the  Church  has 
been  and  done  in  the  past,  and  we  have  glanced  at 
her  present  condition.  We  have  now  to  ask.  What 
is  the  Church,  as  a  world  agency,  to  be  and  do  in 
the  future  for  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom  ?  What 
she  could  and  should  be  and  do  is  one  thing,  and 
what  she  actually  will  or  may  be  and  do  is  quite 
another. 

I  confidently  believe  that  if  the  Church  fully 
realized  her  power,  her  opportunity  and  her  privi- 
lege, and  if  she  were  fully  prepared  to  meet  exist- 


140  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

ing  and  coming  exigencies,  that,  in  a  comparatively 
short  space  of  time,  she  would  herself  fully  enter, 
and  draw  the  whole  world  into  the  gospel  of  the 
kingdom.  My  hope  is  that  after  some  further  un- 
successful struggle,  the  Church  will  come  to  see  and 
feel  her  deficiencies,  and  her  need  of  a  broader 
platform  than  the  one  on  which  she  is  now  stand- 
ing. If  she  does  this,  as  both  internal  and  external 
pressure  is  strongly  urging  her  to  do,  then  her  con- 
tinued prestige  and  power  are  assured.  If  the 
Church  leads  the  way  the  world  is  prepared,  or  is 
preparing  to  follow  her  lead,  as  the  wake  follows 
the  ship  on  a  smooth  and  open  sea.  Denomi' 
national  and  sectarian  barriers  are  breaking  down ; 
restlessness  is  universal,  the  door  of  hope  is  open- 
ing, and  there  is  ground  for  confident  expectation 
that  the  Church  will  be  the  greatest  of  all  agencies 
for  the  coming  of  the  kingdom. 

Observation  from  all  quarters  encourages  this 
hope.  On  every  hand  the  Christian  Church  is 
modifying  and  enlarging  her  view  of  religion. 
Compare  the  present  with  one  hundred  or  even  fifty 
years  ago,  and  how  much  less  exclusive,  and  more 
generous  towards  each  other  the  Churches  are  now 
than  they  were  then.  In  doctrine,  although  creeds 
may  remain  the  same,  ministers  and  members  are 


RELIGIOUS  AND  CHUBCR  AGENCIES.  141 

less  creed-bound  and  tliey  enjoy  greater  freedom 
than  they  did  formerly.  Preaching  the  gospel 
means  more  now  than  it  was  once  thought  to  mean. 
It  covers  a  wider  range  of  subjects.  The  pulpit  has 
a  larger  liberty.  The  majority  of  Church  members 
desire  and  expect  their  ministers  to  study  the  moral 
aspects  of  all  questions  of  public  interest  and  to 
expound  them  to  the  people.  These  and  other 
corresponding  changes  inspire  hope  that  the  Church 
will  continue  to  move  onward,  enter  fully  into  the 
kino'dom  herself  and  draw  the  world  after  her. 

Then,  again,  this  general  view  is  yet  further  en- 
couraged if  we  study  the  class  of  religious  agencies 
that  have  been  organized  from  the  Church,  and 
many  of  them  by  the  Church,  and  that  are  w^orking 
largely  for  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom.  I  know  it 
has  been  claimed,  and  with  some  reason,  that  the 
Church  now  has  within  herself,  and  hanging  upon 
her  skirts,  too  many  of  such  separate  organizations. 
Their  great  number,  it  is  said,  is  explained  by  the 
fact  that  many  things  need  doing,  and  that,  as  the 
Church  is  not  ready  or  willing  to  undertake  them, 
individuals  in  the  Church  and  out  of  it  organize 
societies  to  meet  the  emergency.  The  Church,  it  is 
said,  is  too  much  organized;  that  is  to  say,  she 
ought  herself  to  do  the  work  that  these  separate 


142  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

societies  undertake  to  perform.  Granting  this,  it 
yet  remains  true  that  most  of  these  "  wheels  within 
wheels  "  are  doing  Avork  that  needs  doing,  and  that 
otherwise  would  be  neglected. 

Christian  missions,  home  and  foreign,  twin 
daughters  of  the  Church,  head  the  list  of  religious 
agencies  that  are  working  towards  the  gospel  of  the 
kingdom.  Christ  intended  that  His  kingdom  in 
the  world,  by  whatever  name  it  was  called,  should 
be  a  missionary  movement ;  and  He  commissioned 
His  disciples  to  go  into  all  the  world  and  preach 
the  gospel  to  every  creature.  How  this  commission 
throughout  the  centuries  has  been  regarded  by  the 
Christian  Church  cannot  now  be  told. 

Organized  modern  missions,  in  Protestant  Chris- 
tendom, had  their  origin  at  the  beginning  of  the 
nineteenth  century.  Since  then,  missionary  boards, 
home  and  foreign,  have  been  organized  and  are 
controlled  by  the  denominations  they  represent. 
Others,  and  some  of  the  most  eflacient,  were  organ- 
ized and  are  conducted  by  Christian  men  outside  of 
Church  control ;  but  they,  none  the  less,  belong  to 
the  kingdom. 

The  necessity  for  efficient  missionary  work,  if 
Christ's  kingdom  is  to  come  on  earth  as  it  is  in 
heaven,   is    obvious.      How    otherwise    could   the 


BELIGI0U8  AND  CHURCH  AGENCIES.  143 

gospel  news  of  the  kingdom  be  carried  to  unchris- 
tian people  ?  Settlements  in  the  newer  portions  of 
our  own  country,  and  of  other  lands,  are  largely 
dependent,  often  for  years, — if  churches  are  to  be 
sustained, — on  outside  support.  In  unchristian 
lands  this  necessity  is  still  greater.  Hence  the  need 
of  both  home  and  foreign  missionary  societies  is 
imperative.  There  is  work  for  them  everywhere, 
and  the  congested  portions  of  great  cities  are  not 
the  least  needy. 

The  good  that  missionary  labors  have  accom- 
plished in  their  various  fields  is  incalculable. 
Where  would  our  country  and  the  world  be  to-day 
but  for  mission  service  and  support !  Criticize  this 
class  of  operations  as  some  do,  still  the  fact  remains 
that  mission  work  is  indispensable.  The  time  will 
come  when  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom  will  have 
enlightened  the  whole  earth.  Then,  it  will  be 
found  that  Christian  missions  will  have  had  more 
to  do  with  laying  foundations,  breaking  up  dead 
forms,  sowing  the  seeds  of  truth  and  life,  preparing 
the  way  of  the  Lord,  and  in  bringing  darkness  into 
light  and  death  into  life,  than  is  now  even  im- 
agined, especially  by  those  who  look  on  missions 
through  eyes  of  prejudice. 

Eight  or  wrong,  missionary  boards  are,  just  now, 


144  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

on  trial  in  the  court  of  the  world.  Their  manage- 
ment at  home,  and  their  work  on  their  fields  is 
criticized.  As  a  result,  missionary  treasuries  are 
not  filled ;  and  vast  sums  of  money,  not  less  than 
$50,000,000  a  year  is  given,  most  of  it  by  Christian 
men,  to  educational  and  other  institutions  outside 
of  Church  control,  and  partly  for  that  reason. 
Such  facts  suggest  not  that  missionary  work  is  un- 
necessary, but  that  missionary  managers  and  work- 
ers should  review  and  revise  their  methods  and 
make  them  conform,  if  they  do  not,  to  sound 
business  principles,  and  to  existing  conditions  and 
needs,  as  seen  in  the  new  light  that  observation 
and  experience  have  cast  upon  them. 

Great  changes  and  improvements  have  been 
made  in  the  last  fifty  years  in  methods  of  mission- 
ary work  in  unchristian  lands.  Previously  mission- 
aries were  expected  simply  to  preach  the  gospel, 
while  the  establishment  of  schools,  and  all  efforts 
in  the  direction  of  general  enlightenment  and 
civilization  were  discouraged.  ]^ow  it  is  far  other- 
wise. Schools,  often  of  high  order,  are  established, 
and  have  great  prominence;  and  while  formally 
only  delusion  and  evil  were  seen  in  the  religious 
ideas  and  teachings  of  pagan  nations,  now  mission- 
aries are  disposed  to  look  on  the  better  side  of  the 


RELIGIOUS  AND  CHURCH  AGENCIES.  145 

religions  Avith  which  they  come  in  contact.  Other 
great  improvements,  both  in  management  and  in 
work  on  the  field,  that  should  do  much  to  silence 
criticism,  and  inspire  confidence  have  been  adopted. 
Missionary  work,  at  home  and  abroad,  is  advancing 
in  excellence  as  the  decades  come  and  go.  Not  till 
the  gospel  of  the  kingdom  shall  have  come  on  earth 
as  it  is  in  heaven,  can  missionary  agencies  be  set 
aside  as  unnecessary. 

Another  class  of  almost  sacred  agencies  which 
belong  to  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom,  even  more 
than  to  that  of  the  Church,  all  born  of  Christianity, 
is  the  system  of  eleemosynary  institutions,  for  the 
relief  of  suffering  humanity,  that  we  find  honoring 
and  blessing  the  people  of  every  Christian  land. 
These  institutions  are  as  numerous  and  varied, 
almost,  as  are  the  needs  of  a  suffering  world.  Hos- 
pitals for  the  sick,  homes  for  the  aged  and  infirm, 
asylums  for  the  blind,  for  the  deaf  and  dumb,  for 
orphans,  and  for  imbeciles, — these  are  among  the 
agencies  that  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom  and,  to 
some  extent,  that  of  the  Church,  have  established 
and  are  supporting  in  all  Christian  lands  as 
works  of  charity  and  love  for  the  amelioration 
of  human  suffering.  That  all  this  is  in  accord 
with     Christ's     example     and     His    teaching     of 


146  TEE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

the    kingdom,    is   clearly   revealed    in   the   gospel 
record. 

Up  to  Christ's  day  suffering  humanity,  especially 
if  joined  to  poverty,  was  left  to  suffer  on  and  die 
of  sheer  neglect,  and  often  with  little  feeling  of 
sympathy.  Among  some  of  the  ancient  peoples  it 
is  said  that  the  aged  and  helpless  were  often  put  to 
death,  so  that  society  might  be  rid  of  them  and  that 
their  "  living  death  "  might  come  to  a  speedy  end. 
Not  till  long  after  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom  began 
to  be  preached  were  institutions  for  the  unfortunate 
established ;  and  for  generations  later,  they  were 
few  in  number,  narrow  in  range,  rude  in  form,  un- 
comfortable, and  but  poorly  sustained. 

All  this  has  passed  away.  Charitable  institutions 
are  now  palatial  structures;  and,  as  a  rule,  they 
occupy  the  most  sightly  and  commanding  positions 
in  our  large  towns  and  cities ;  and  besides,  they  are 
richly  furnished,  largely  endowed  and  are  in  the 
hands  of  managers  and  experts,  so  that  now  sick- 
ness and  misfortune  have  almost  lost  their  terrors. 
While  the  Churches  have  done  something,  and  in 
some  directions  much,  towards  bringing  about  such 
desirable  results,  yet,  it  must  be  conceded  that  a 
large  part  of  the  countless  millions  that  have  gone 
into  the  establishment  and  operation  of  eleemosy- 


BELIGIOUS  AND  CHUMCH  AGENCIES.  147 

nary  institutions,  have  not  come  from  Churches 
directly,  but  from  parties  who  have  been  acting  for 
themselves  outside  of  Church  control  or  responsi- 
bility. Nevertheless,  this  whole  class  of  work  be- 
longs to  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom,  as  Jesus  com- 
prehended and,  in  principle,  proclaimed  it.  It  is 
one  of  the  great  channels  along  which  the  world 
and  the  kingdom  are  flowing  together  towards  the 
great  consummation. 

It  is  due  to  the  Christian  Church  to  explain  that 
while  some  of  the  agencies  just  referred  to  are  not 
organized  and  controlled  by  the  Church,  as  such, 
that  still  a  large  part  of  the  money  given  and  work 
done,  is  by  Church  members ;  and,  in  this  sense, 
these  agencies  are  Christian  if  they  are  not  strictly 
Church  enterprises.  Should  Church  people  with- 
draw their  support,  it  is  probable  that  not  one  of 
them  could  long  survive.  This  great  fact  may  not 
be  obscured. 

Other  religious  agencies  clustering  around  the 
Church,  but  not  always  of  it,  as  they  are  of  the 
kingdom,  and  that  deserve  larger  notice,  may  be 
grouped  together.  I  refer  to  such  as  relate  chiefl}'' 
to  young  people.  Prominent  among  them  are 
Sunday-schools,  Societies  of  Christian  Endeavor, 
Young  Men's  and  Young  Women's  Christian  Asso- 


148  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

ciations  and  many  other  organizations  having  dif- 
ferent names,  but  all  working  in  the  interests  of 
young  humanity.  If  the  Church  were  as  large  as 
the  kingdom,  such  separate  organizations  might  not 
be  called  for ;  but  as  things  now  are,  they  seem 
necessary  and  of  great  value.  These  institutions, 
though  generally  not  under  church  control,  have 
been  the  training  schools  of  the  Church,  from 
which  multitudes  have  come  into  its  fellowship, 
bringing  with  them  abundance  of  zeal  and  progress- 
ive energy.  Where  would  the  churches  be  to-day 
had  they  continued  as  they  have  been,  and  these 
young  people's  societies  had  never  existed ! 

It  cannot  be  expected  of  the  "rank  and  file" 
that  make  up  these  societies,  that  many  of  them 
will  be  very  large  in  experience,  or  profound  in 
thought.  But  what  they  lack  in  experience,  they 
make  up  in  zeal;  and  deficiency  in  knowledge  is 
offset  by  activity.  They  delight  in  great  and 
showy  conventions ;  they  run  to  and  fro,  and  con- 
stitute the  flying  brigade  in  the  Lord's  army,  and 
are  a  source  from  which  great  leaders  in  the  work 
of  the  world  are  likely  to  arise.  As  their  member- 
ship is  drawn  from  all  the  Churches,  their  working 
together  in  the  spirit  of  love  and  fellowship  does 
much  to  break  up  sectarian  exclusiveness,  and  so  to 


BELIGIOUS  AND  CHURCH  AGENCIES,  149 

help  broaden  the  Church  into  the  gospel  of  the 
kingdom.     May  Divine  guidance  attend  their  steps. 

Another  important  religious  movement,  and  one 
that  belongs  more  to  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom 
than  to  that  of  the  Church,  lies  in  the  department  of 
general  reform ;  and  of  reform,  not  so  much  in  in- 
dividual lives,  as  of  reform  where  great  evils  and 
wrongs  have  entrenched  themselves  in  communities 
and,  sometimes,  in  nations.  The  Church  has  al- 
ways been  persistent  and  zealous  in  her  efforts  to 
convert  individuals  from  the  world  and  bring  them 
within  the  fold  of  the  Church  ;  but  as  to  great  re- 
formatory movements  outside  of  the  Church,  but 
not  outside  of  the  kingdom,  she  has  had  compara- 
tively, as  an  organization,  but  little  to  do.  Kegard- 
ing  them  as  not  in  her  province,  she  has  been  often 
indifferent  to  them,  and,  sometimes,  opposed  where 
she  should  have  been  a  faithful  ally,  if  not  the 
brave  leader. 

When  Copernicus  discovered  and  brought  to  light 
a  new  universe,  and  when  Galileo  affirmed  that  the 
earth  went  around  the  sun,  the  Church  was  then 
the  chief  foe  that  had  to  be  met  and  vanquished. 
So  it  was  when  the  age  of  the  earth  and  the  an- 
tiquity of  man  were  made  to  extend  far  back  of 
six  thousand  years ;  and  so  it  has  been  when  any 


150  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGD03I. 

great  scientific  discovery  has  seemed  to  interfere 
with  Church  traditions. 

But  it  is  with  moral  reforms  rather  than  scien- 
tific movements  that  we  are  now  chiefly  concerned. 
Let  us  select  one  or  two  examples  as  illustrations 
of  many  others.  The  slavery  question  naturally 
suggests  itself.  Yiewed  in  the  light  of  Christ's  law 
of  love  and  of  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom,  "  slavery 
was  the  sum  of  all  villainies."  And  yet  our 
Churches,  for  a  long  time,  would  not  attack  it.  In- 
deed, they  were  often  its  bulwark  of  defense,  de- 
claring that  to  preach  against  it  was  to  preach 
politics  and  not  religion,  and  to  contradict  Moses. 
But  the  reform  belonged  to  the  greater  gospel  of 
the  kingdom ;  the  evolutionary  upheaval  was  un- 
derneath slavery,  and  it  had  to  fall ;  and  when  the 
popular  tide  changed,  the  Church,  as  always, 
changed  with  it,  and  it  now  changed  gladly. 

In  what  is  known  as  the  temperance  reform, 
the  Church  has  been  far  more  active,  but  the  larger 
gospel  of  the  kingdom  has  been  the  foremost 
worker  and  must,  in  the  end,  accomplish  the  Divine 
purpose.  In  the  field  of  socialistic  reform,  inclu- 
ding capital  and  labor,  now  agitating  the  world,  and 
with  which  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom  is  so  deeply 
concerned,  because  human  interests  are  so  deeply 


BELIGIOUS  AND  CHURCH  AGENCIES.  151 

involved, — the  Church  very  generally  stands  aloof 
and  often  gives  as  a  reason,  that  the  subject  lies 
outside  her  field  of  labor.  On  questions  of  Biblical 
criticism  and  revised  theological  statement,  such  as 
advancing  knowledge  and  the  gospel  of  the  king- 
dom call  for,  our  Churches  are  only  in  a  position  to 
accept  the  inevitable  when  the  reform  is  carried 
and  assent  becomes  a  necessity.  To  these  state- 
ments there  are  numerous  individual  exceptions, 
and  some  Church  excepticJns. 

Prison  reform,  reform  in  the  homes  and  houses 
of  poor  people,  are  questions  in  which  the  gospel  of 
the  kingdom  and,  in  part,  of  the  Church,  is  deeply 
interested.  Indeed,  the  world  is  yet  full  of  evils 
that  call  for  correction,  and  the  mission  of  the 
Church,  as  commonly  understood  and  accepted  by 
her  leaders,  is  not  large  enough  to  enable  her  to 
meet  as  they  should  be  met,  the  many  cries  for  help 
that  are  coming  up  from  all  quarters.  Even  if  she 
would  gladly  respond  to  them,  her  narrow  platform 
would  make  such  a  response  impossible.  The  gos- 
pel of  the  kingdom,  which  is  large  enough  to  em- 
brace them  all,  must  be  chiefly  relied  on  for  reform 
work,  and  the  Church  can  become  an  eflBcient 
helper  just  in  proportion  as  she  broadens  and  moves 
on  into  the  kingdom.     The  central  point  we  are 


152  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

ever  to  keep  in  view  is,  that  the  kingdom  is  greater 
than  the  Church,  and  that  the  Church  must  flow 
into  the  kingdom  if  she  is  to  be  a  world-wide  re- 
former. 

Thus  have  passed  in  review  a  class  of  religious 
agencies  that  belong  largely  to  the  gospel  of  the 
Church  and  wholly  to  that  of  the  kingdom.  From 
this  study,  it  is  evident  that  the  Church  is  moving, 
slowly  it  may  be,  but  still,  moving  towards  the 
kingdom.  She  is  far  in  advance  to-day  of  what  she 
was  fifty  years  ago,  while  yet,  the  gospel  of  the 
kingdom  is  vastly  greater  than  is  that  of  the 
Church.  The  future  must  determine  as  to  whether 
or  not  the  Church  will  throw  off  her  denominational 
and  sectarian  bonds,  broaden  her  thoughts  and 
plans  of  work  and  keep  pace  with  the  evolutionary 
providence  of  God,  until  she  is  merged  in  the  gospel 
of  the  kingdom.  If  she  does  this,  the  whole  world 
will  be  drawn  after  her  and  heaven  will  be  set  up 
on  earth. 

But,  on  the  other  hand,  should  she  halt  by  the 
way  and  refuse  to  advance,  other  agencies  would 
be  raised  up  to  take  her  place  and  do  her  work.  In 
such  a  sad  case  the  world  would  still  move  on,  leav- 
ing the  churches  behind,  a  fleet  of  dismantled  ships, 
drifting  listlessly  and  helplessly  on  the  troubled  sea 


RELIGIOUS  AND  CHURCH  AGENCIES.  153 

of  the  twentieth  or  some  succeeding  century. 
Standing  on  my  crumbling  watch-tower  and  sur- 
veying the  scene,  past,  present  and  future,  I  am  en- 
couraged to  believe  that  the  Church  will  recognize 
the  voice  of  God  and  be  enlarged  into  the  kingdom 
as  Jesus  saw  and,  in  principle,  proclaimed  it  to  all 
the  world. 


IX. 

AGENCIES  FOE  THE  KINGDOM  THAT  LIE 
OUTSIDE  OF  THE  CHUKCH. 


IX. 

AGENCIES   FOR  THE   KINGDOM  THAT   LIE  OUTSIDE 
OF  THE  CHURCH. 

We  have  seen  that  all  useful  uplifting  agencies, 
work  for  the  kingdom,  and  that  these  agencies  are 
of  two  classes.  One  class  is  of  the  Church  and  re- 
lates to  religion,  including  the  will,  sensibility  and 
in  part,  the  imagination.  The  other  is  of  the  in- 
tellect, and  includes  the  exercise  and  cultivation  of 
all  one's  intellectual  powers.  Both  are  educational 
and  elevating,  and  lead  along  different  lines  into 
the  kingdom. 

The  precediug  chapter  was  upon  agencies  of  the 
religious  order.  We  are  now  to  consider  the  other 
class  of  agencies  that  does  not  claim  to  be  religious, 
that  certainly  does  not  belong  to  the  gospel  of  the 
Church,  but  does  belong  to  that  of  the  kingdom,  in 
the  sense  that  it  elevates  mankind,  socially,  in- 
dustrially, intellectually  and  morally,  and  so  pre- 
pares the  world  for  the  coming  of  the  kingdom. 

I  know  it  has  been  claimed  that  intelligence, 
morality,  physical  comfort  and  possessions  are  not 

157 


158  TEE  GOSPEL  OF  TEE  KINGDOM. 

religious.  Well,  all  I  care  to  say  now,  on  that 
point,  is  that  thej  are  so  essential  to  religion  that  a 
religion  which  is  destitute  of  them  must  be  of  a  very 
low  order.  It  can  be  little  more  than  superstition 
miscalled  religion.  Possibly  men  like  Mr.  Buckle, 
— and  he  represents  a  class, — may  have  exalted  in- 
tellectual culture  and  physical  prosperity  too  highly 
as  compared  with  moral  and  spiritual  advancement ; 
but  they  are  right  in  claiming  that  these  are  a  part, 
and  a  necessary  part  of  the  religious  life  of  the 
world. 

What  I  now  propose  is  to  consider  some  of  the 
second  class  of  agencies  which  so  belong  to  the  gospel 
of  the  kingdom  that  it  could  never  be  established 
on  earth  as  in  heaven  without  their  uplifting  sup- 
port. Indeed,  they  must  stand  in  the  first  rank  of 
influences  for  that  end.  This  is  so  evident  that 
further  argument  on  this  point  is  unnecessary. 

Foremost  among  these  agencies  are  schools,  great 
and  small,  for  the  education  of  the  people.  Where 
Christianity  is  not  the  prevailing  religion,  children 
grow  up  in  ignorance,  and  ignorance  is  the  mother 
of  superstition  and  of  vice.  In  most  anti-Christian 
lands  but  few  of  the  people  are  able  to  read  or 
write.  This  has  always  been  so,  and  is  still.  In 
nominally   Christian    nations    where    the    Church 


AGENCIES  FOR  THE  KINGD03I.  159 

undertakes  to  control  ecUication  in  the  interests  of 
the  Church,  as  in  Spain,  Italy,  and  Russia,  the  busi- 
ness is  so  miserably  managed  that  one-half  of  the 
inhabitants  are  wholly  illiterate.  The  value  of 
education  is  happily  illustrated  in  what  we  see  and 
enjoy  in  the  United  States.  Our  free  school  system, 
sustained  by  the  government,  and  open  to  every 
child  and  youth  of  the  land,  secures  general  in- 
telligence ;  and  intelligence  is  the  basis  of  civil 
liberty,  of  individual  and  family  prosperity,  and  of 
national  advance  in  all  that  is  worth  possessing. 
Our  free  school  system  is  the  nation's  glory,  and  be- 
longs to  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom. 

In  addition  to  public  schools,  we  have  academies, 
colleges,  universities  and  professional  institutions 
almost  Tvithout  number ;  and  the  best  talent  of  our 
land,  and  its  profoundest  scholars  have  the  guid- 
ance of  these  schools,  especially  in  their  upper 
ranks.  And  what  limitless  sums  of  money  as  well 
as  of  labor  are  expended  upon  them  year  by  year. 
A  part  of  this  vast  and  ever-increasing  investment 
is  collected  by  taxation,  but  schools  of  high  grade 
are  nearly  all  of  them  supported  by  the  voluntary 
gifts  of  men  who  know  and  appreciate  their  value. 
Men  of  vast  wealth  are  coming  to  see  the  worth  of 
great  institutions  of  learning  to  the  people,  to  the 


160  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

nations,  and  to  the  kingdom  of  God  ;  and  to  see  and 
feel  their  own  responsibilities  and  privileges  in  re- 
lation to  them.  It  is  estimated  that  about  fifty 
millions  of  dollars  annually  are  freely  given,  often 
millions  at  a  time,  for  the  enlargement  and  support 
of  higher  educational  institutions.  In  the  schools 
of  the  land  about  sixteen  millions  of  children  and 
young  people  are  being  educated;  and  what  vast 
multitudes  go  out  annually  into  business  or  profes- 
sional life  to  help  build  up  and  swell  the  tide  of 
influences  that  sweep  on  into  the  gospel  of  the 
kingdom  !  Educational  movements  are,  indeed,  a 
part,  a  large  part,  of  that  kingdom.  Take  the  edu- 
cated men  and  women  out  of  the  world  and  what 
would  there  be  left,  either  in  fact  or  in  prospect ! 
Where  then  would  the  gospel  of  the  Church  or  of 
the  kingdom  be?  If  sound  education  is  not  an 
essential  and  necessary  element  of  Christ's  king- 
dom, then  nothing  is. 

Works  of  art  belong  to  the  class  of  subjects  here 
indicated  ;  and  this,  because  of  their  aesthetic  nature 
and  tendency  to  enlarge,  beautify  and  ennoble  the 
human  mind.  Greek  art,  especially  in  the  form  of 
sculpture,  which  was  carried  by  the  Greeks  almost 
to  perfection,  and  was  a  part  of  their  religion,  had 
much   to   do   with   the   civilization   and   elevation 


AGENCIES  FOB  THE  KINGDOM,  161 

which  distinguished  that  people  above  all  others  of 
their  day. 

Architecture,  almost  equally  with  sculpture,  is  an 
ancient,  as  it  is  also  a  modern  art.  Some  of  the 
structures  of  Greek  art,  the  Parthenon,  for  ex- 
ample, have  been  the  admiration  and  models  of  all 
succeeding  ages.  Their  three  styles  of  column, 
always  so  attractive,  have  never  been  improved 
upon  or  superseded. 

During  the  rennaissant  period,  in  Europe,  archi- 
tecture, especially  in  the  erection  of  cathedrals  for 
Divine  worship,  took  on  a  new  form,  in  which 
nature  and  her  forests  became  the  model  for  imita- 
tion, and  the  Gothic  style  of  architecture,  succeed- 
ing severer  forms,  was  the  almost  worshipful  pas- 
sion of  several  centuries,  and  the  craze  still  con- 
tinues. 

In  this  same  period,  painting,  as  a  religious  art, 
came  into  a  prominence  that  it  had  never  previously 
attained.  It  was  idealistic  rather  than  realistic  in 
character ;  and  it  meant  helpfulness  in  the  field  of 
Christian  conception  and  worship.  If,  in  subse- 
quent generations,  painting  has  become  more  showy, 
imitative  and  realistic,  it  has  never  reached  the 
moral  power,  the  aesthetic  beauty  which  it  attained 
in  the  Eaphaelistic  age,  .as  the  great  interest  still 


162  TEE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM, 

felt  in  old  masterpieces,  evinces.  And  yet,  now 
and  always,  painting  is  the  handmaid  of  religion ; 
and,  with  art,  in  every  good  form,  is  a  large  ele- 
ment in  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom. 

Literature,  using  the  word  in  its  largest  sense,  is 
another  great  factor  in  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom, 
and  is  a  powerful  agency  for  its  advancement.  In 
ancient  times  there  were  comparativel}^  few  books, 
and  these  were  all  written  by  hand,  and,  when  not 
chronicles,  were,  for  the  most  part,  books  of  relig- 
ion. As  such,  even  while  abounding  in  errors,  they 
led  the  human  mind  Godward,  A  half  truth,  or 
truth  and  error  more  or  less  commingled,  has  its 
mission  for  good,  otherwise  what  book  would  be  of 
value  ? 

In  modern  times,  and  especially  in  the  nine- 
teenth century,  books  and  libraries,  public  and 
private,  have  increased  and  are  still  increasing 
beyond  all  precedent.  As  for  magazines,  news- 
papers and  other  periodicals,  the  total  amount  is 
almost  beyond  the  reach  of  computation.  And 
their  influence  as  public  educators  and  in  moulding 
the  thought,  character  and  life  of  the  people  is 
beyond  that  of  any  other  single  agency.  Even  our 
schools  would  be  powerless,  but  for  the  books  that 
are   published  in  their  interest.     Mr.  Carnegie  is 


AGENCIES  FOB  THE  KINGDOM.  163 

right  in  the  estimate  he  puts  on  free  libraries  for 
all  the  people,  and  in  giving  his  tens  of  millions  for 
their  establishment  among  the  English-speaking 
people  of  the  world. 

True,  many  books  and  periodicals  should  have 
been  better  than  they  are,  and  many  others  are 
worse  than  worthless,  and  should  never  have  been 
published.  But  for  all  this,  books  and  papers,  what 
is  called  the  world's  literature,  is  one  of  the  great 
uplifting  agencies  that,  in  many  ways,  is  drawing 
the  world  into  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom.  Indeed, 
the  pulpit  itself,  has  now  to  vie  with  the  printing 
press ;  people  are  so  educated  and  informed  that  the 
pulpit  must  be  intelligent  and  progressive  or  lose 
its  power.  The  Church  must  reckon  with  the  press 
and  with  growing  knowledge  more  than  she  has  in 
the  past,  and  with  creeds,  traditions  and  platitudes 
less,  if  she  would  meet  existing  necessities  and 
work  with,  and  not  apart  from,  the  kingdom  of 
God.  She  must  enlarge  her  conception  of  Church 
privilege  and  responsibility ;  and,  indeed,  she  is 
doing  it  in  many  quarters.  Men  now  care  for  good 
sermons,  but  not  for  poor  ones. 

Coming  now  to  the  question  of  Invention^  we 
have  another  of  those  influences  that  lie  outside  the 
Christian  Church,  and  yet  that  belong  to  the  gospel 


164  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

of  the  kingdom,  and  have  much  to  do  with  its  ad- 
vancement. But  for  great  discoveries  the  world 
might  be  to-day  essentially  where  it  was  a  thousand 
years  ago.  In  every  department  of  human  activity 
we  have  inventions,  and  processes  for  doing  things 
that  were  unknown  to  the  people  of  one  hundred 
years  ago.  The  steel  pen  I  am  writing  with  was 
then  a  goose  quill  that  required  constant  whittling. 
Our  clothes  are  better,  cheaper  and  differently 
manufactured.  All  the  mechanic  arts  have  gradu- 
ated from  old  time  processes.  The  agricultural 
implements  of  to-day  were  not  dreamed  of  as  pos- 
sibilities a  century  ago.  Think  of  one  man  culti- 
vating one  hundred  acres  of  grain  alone,  and  rais- 
ing great  crops  ;  or  of  his  harvesting  from  twelve 
to  fifteen  acres  of  heavy  wheat,  cutting,  binding 
and  shocking  it,  all  by  himself,  in  one  day  !  In  the 
manufacturing  world  the  change  has  been  still 
greater,  so  that  in  many  departments  one  man,  or 
woman  even,  can  accomplish  from  ten  to  fifty  times 
more  than  the  same  amount  of  labor  produced 
within  the  memory  of  some  now  living.  Whitney's 
cotton  gin  has  performed  miracles,  if  real  miracles 
do  actually  take  place. 

jSTot  to  deal  with  small  things,  let  us  glance  at 
three  familiar  illustrations.     The  invention  of  the 


AGENCIES  FOR  THE  KINGDOM.  165 

printing  press  marked  a  new  era  in  the  world's  his- 
tory ;  it  brought  first-hand  knowledge  to  the  com- 
mon people  and  made  education  a  necessity.  But 
the  printing  press  of  to-day,  that  can  throw  off  a 
hundred  thousand  copies  of  great  newspapers  in  an 
hour,  all  folded  and  ready  for  delivery,  would  in- 
deed have  been  a  marvel  to  the  old  German  who 
invented  the  clumsy  hand-press  and  the  still  more 
clumsy  type.  Surely,  in  these  days  many  run  to 
and  fro  and  knowledge  is  increased,  all  of  which 
points  and  leads  to  the  kingdom. 

Again  :  Take  the  application  of  steam, — one  of 
the  simplest  and  commonest  agents  in  nature, — to 
various  kinds  of  machinery,  once  wholly  unknown 
to  man,  and  what  wonders  have  been  wrought ! 
Think  of  huge  iron  vessels,  sometimes  with  twenty 
thousand  tons  of  carrying  capacity,  sweeping  across 
the  ocean,  regardless  of  wind  and  wave,  in  as  many 
days  as  was  once  required  weeks,  for  a  small  wooden 
ship  to  make  a  summer  voyage  !  One  vessel  now 
does  the  work  that  a  hundred  formerly  did.  Turn 
from  the  ship  to  the  railroad  and  the  marvel,  if 
possible,  is  still  greater.  See  that  great  iron  horse 
running  fifty  miles  an  hour,  on  an  iron  track,  with 
a  long  line  of  parlor  cars  fall  of  people  at  its  heels ! 
Or  see  him  again,  dragging  swiftly  a  hundred  great 


166  TEE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

wagons  loaded  with  coal,  holding  ten  tons  each ; 
and  as  he  winds  past,  half  a  mile  long,  one  can 
hardly  refrain  from  taking  off  one's  hat  and  bow- 
ing in  holy  reverence  !  No  wonder  that  when  Mr. 
Stevenson  was  told  that  the  time  would  come  when 
men  would  ride  after  steam  engines  at  the  rate  of 
twenty  miles  an  hour,  he  exclaimed,  "I  would  as 
soon  think  of  crawling  into  one  of  Congreve's  mor- 
tars and  being  shot  off  for  a  rocket,  as  to  risk  my 
life  in  a  train  of  cars  running  twenty  miles  an 
hour."  "What  would  he  say  now  were  he  living  on 
the  earth  ?  Would  he  not  think  that  he  was,  in- 
deed, riding  into  the  kingdom  of  God  ! 

But  the  greatest  of  all  modern  inventions  is  in 
the  department  of  electricity.  Lightning  flashing 
in  the  heavens,  amid  peals  of  thunder,  has  always 
been  an  object  of  dread,  as  well  as  of  admiration, 
to  mankind  ;  and  it  was  never  conceived  that  so 
violent,  and  restless  an  element  could  ever  be 
tamed,  harnessed  and  held  under  men's  control. 
Behold  the  change!  The  whole  continent,  and 
every  continent,  is  now  strung  with  telegraphic 
and  telephonic  wires,  and  people  separated  by  long 
distances  converse  with  each  other  as  freely  almost 
as  if  they  were  seated  together  in  an  ordinary 
room.     Nor  is  this  all.     Oceans  separating  conti- 


AGENCIES  FOR  THE  KINGDOM,  167 

nent  from  continent,  no  longer  seem  to  exist.  If 
San  Francisco,  Chicago,  New  York,  London,  Paris, 
Berlin,  St.  Petersburg  and  cities  in  the  far  East,  till 
we  should  come  back  to  our  starting-point,  were 
all  consolidated,  as  departments  of  one  vast  city, — 
as  Manhattan,  Brooklyn  and  the  Bronx  are  consoli- 
dated,— they  would  not,  in  reality,  be  much  nearer 
each  other,  or  more  intercommunicable  than  they 
are  now.  Every  morning  before  breakfast,  we  read 
from  the  daily  papers  of  everything  of  general  in- 
terest that  may  have  taken  place  in  any  part  of  the 
globe  in  the  preceding  twenty-four  hours. 

And  yet,  we  are  told  by  the  wise  ones  that  dis- 
coveries in  the  field  of  electricity  are  still  in  their 
infancy,  that  we  are  only  at  the  portals,  or,  at  best, 
in  the  vestibule  of  the  great  temple  of  electric 
wonders.  What  the  future  is  to  reveal,  the  future 
only  can  disclose.  When  the  revelations  come, 
they  will  not  be  appeals  to  the  imagination,  but 
matters  of  actual  observation  and  experience  that 
all  men  will  see  and  enjoy.  Such  discoveries  and 
their  fruits  help  to  merge  the  gospel  of  the  Church 
and  the  world  into  the  kingdom,  and  to  hasten  its 
consummation. 

Commerce,  or  the  interchange  of  commodities 
between  commercial  states  and  nations,  now  so  de- 


168  TBE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM, 

pendent  on  electricity  for  intercommunication,  is 
another  agency  that  works  in  the  interests  of  civili- 
zation, and  so  of  the  kingdom.  Commerce  has  al- 
ways been  in  the  world  ;  but  what  vast  proportions 
it  is  now  assuming  !  Every  available  means  of  con- 
veyance by  sea  and  land  is  taxed  to  its  utmost  in 
conveying  to  and  fro,  the  products  of  mines,  farms 
and  factories  from  places  of  production  into  the 
reach  of  consumers  in  all  parts  of  the  world.  This 
interchange  of  commodities  is  a  great  civilizer.  It 
supplies  needs  and  comforts,  and  creates  friendly 
feeling,  mutual  interest,  general  information,  a 
sense  of  brotherhood  and  of  mutual  dependence, 
and,  in  many  ways  leads  into  the  gospel  of  the 
kingdom.  Let  commerce  cease  and  the  world 
would  stagnate  and  return  to  barbarism. 

One  other  subject  remains  for  brief  notice ;  and 
this  is  the  great  scientific  movement  of  the  world. 

Science,  as  represented  by  a  class  of  studious  men 
known  as  scientists,  and  religion,  as  represented  by 
the  Christian  Church,  have  not,  throughout  the  cen- 
turies, been  in  mutual  sympathy  and  accord.  They 
could  not  be.  To  a  great  extent  they  have  been 
antagonistic  ;  and  this  antagonism  has  not  been  ac- 
cidental, or  incidental.  It  has  grown  necessarily 
out  of  the  radically  different  methods  of  investiga- 


AGENCIES  FOB  THE  KINGDOM.  l69 

tion  and  conclusion  adopted  respectively,  by  the 
two  classes  of  investigators. 

The  scientific  method  has  been,  certainly  for  the 
last  two  or  three  hundred  years,  inductive,  rational 
and  evolutionary.  That  is  to  say,  scientists,  in 
place  of  beginning  their  investigations  by  laying 
down  hypotheses  or  propositions  to  be  proven,  have 
begun  with  the  collection  and  study  of  unmistak- 
able facts  lying  in  their  special  fields  of  study. 
These  facts  when  collected  as  numerously  as  pos- 
sible, have  been  classified,  and  then  the  question 
has  been  raised, — What  conclusion  do  these  un- 
deniable facts  lead  to  and  necessitate?  "What 
principle  or  truth  of  nature  do  they  clearly  reveal, 
establish  and  illustrate  ?  That  conclusion  is  ac- 
cepted as  a  logical  sequence.  It  is  no  longer  a 
problem,  but  a  reality  to  be  adhered  to  and  fol- 
lowed, lead  where  it  may.  This  is  the  scientific 
way  of  finding  truth. 

The  Church's  method  of  reaching  conclusions  has 
been,  and  to  a  great  extent  still  is,  quite  different. 
It  often  begins,  not  with  facts,  but  with  some  pos- 
tulate, or  dogma  to  be  proven,  and  if  stern  facts 
rise  in  opposition,  they  must  somehow  be  argued 
down  or  ignored.  The  fundamental  assumption  of 
the  Church  throughout  the  centuries  has  been  and 


170  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM, 

still  largely  is,  that  the  Bible,  in  all  its  parts,  is  the 
inspired  and  inerrant  word  of  God,  and  is  the  only- 
infallible  rule  of  faith  and  practice.  Many  are 
ready  to  accept  the  concensus  of  the  Church,  and 
ancient  traditions  written  down  in  creeds  and  in 
ancient  documents,  as  of  almost  equal  authority 
with  the  Bible.  But  the  point  to  be  made  is,  that 
the  Church  rests  her  conclusions  upon  authority, 
rather  than  upon  original  investigation.  Hence, 
any  departure  in  faith  or  in  practice  from  this  rule 
of  authority  is  denounced  as  heresy,  as  infidelity,  to 
be  dealt  with  accordingly. 

It  is  obvious  that  when  two  such  systems  of  in- 
vestigation and  conclusion  meet  on  some  common 
ground,  there  will  be  more  or  less  of  disagreement 
and  contention,  and  so  it  ever  has  been. 

When,  as  we  have  seen,  the  new  astronomy  sup- 
planted the  old ;  when  the  new  geology  carried 
creation  back  a  million,  instead  of  six  thousand 
years;  when  evolution  pushed  aside  the  idea  of 
separate  and  independent  creations  ;  when  the  Bible 
began  to  be  studied  by  the  scientific  method,  as  a 
book  of  literature,  and  when  what  is  called  the 
new  theology,  growing  out  of  newer  and  better 
methods  of  investigation  and  interpretation  began 
to  be  preached,  in  all  these  cases,  and  in  others  of 


AGENCIES  FOB  THE  KINGDOM.  l7l 

lesser  note,  the  Church  took  alarm  and  entered 
solemn  protest.  From  her  point  of  view,  she  could 
not  have  done  otherwise.  At  first,  the  Church  de- 
clared that  these  new  doctrines  were  utterly  false. 
Yf  hen  this  did  not  avail,  it  was  declared  that  the 
Bible  was  being  contradicted  and  destroyed,  and 
that  religion  itself  was  in  great  peril.  But,  after- 
wards, when  the  new  way  of  thinking  came  to  be 
fully  established  and  generally  accepted,  the 
Church,  by  some  new  processes  of  interpretation, 
adjusted  herself  to  the  situation,  and  suggested  that 
these  new  views  were  of  no  consequence,  that  they 
were  not  new,  and  that  the  Church  had  always,  for 
substance,  held  them. 

I  am  not  complaining  of  the  Church's  attitude  on 
questions  of  scientific  advance.  According  to  her 
method  of  accepting  conclusions,  largely  on  author- 
ity, she  did  the  most  natural  thing  possible,  and  she 
could  not  have  done  otherwise.  The  Church  is 
right  up  to  a  certain  point,  and  her  only  trouble  is 
that  her  gospel  is  not  large  enough  to  meet  the 
necessities  of  the  case  and  the  wants  of  the  world. 
What  the  Church  needs  is  expansion  of  view  and 
of  life.  Truth  that  rests  on  a  scientific  foundation 
must,  in  the  end,  prevail.  I  cannot  recall  a  single 
historic   record   of    any  important   conflict   where 


17^  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

science,  on  the  one  hand  and  the  Church  on  the 
other,  have  been  engaged,  in  which  science  was  not 
victorious ;  and  this,  in  the  interests  of  both  truth 
and  religion.  Yet  science  is  not  religion  and  can- 
not be,  until  a  certain  heart  quality,  a  loving  acqui- 
escence, is  added  to  that  of  cold  intellectual  appre- 
hension and  assent.  True  religion  is  light  and  love 
combined. 

Between  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom  as  Jesus  saw, 
and,  in  principle,  proclaimed  it,  and  the  onward 
march  of  true  science,  there  is  and  there  can  be  no 
real  friction.  Between  science  falsely  so-called,  and 
religion  that  is  only  such  in  name,  there  must  be 
antagonisms.  ISTor  is  the  fault  all  on  one  side. 
Scientists  are  often  as  narrow,  as  imperious,  as 
bigoted  and  sectarian  as  they  charge  Christians 
with  being.  People  who  live  in  glass  houses  had 
best  not  throw  stones.  What  the  world  needs  most 
is  a  deep  and  sincere  love  of  truth,  regardless  of 
the  source  whence  it  comes,  and  of  the  pathway 
along  which  it  leads.  Jesus  said  :  Ye  shall  know 
the  truth,  and  the  truth  shall  make  you  free.  All 
truth  is  religious,  because  it  is  an  emanation  from 
God  and  leads  back  to  the  source  whence  it 
came. 

The  gospel  of  the  kingdom  is  the  gospel  of  the 


AGENCIES  FOB  THE  KINGD03L  173 

truth.  It  embraces  all  truth  comprehensible  by 
man  and  the  privileges  and  duties  into  which  truth 
leads  the  way.  All  knowledge,  all  science,  all  re- 
form, all  religion,  all  that  is  useful  and  good  in  the 
world,  belong  to  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom. 
The  kingdom  demands  that  science  shall  be 
religious,  and  that  religion  shall  be  scientific. 
When  this  demand  is  fulfilled,  the  tw^o  can 
no  more  antagonize  than  a  house  can  be  divided 
against  itself,  than  one  truth  can  contend  against 
another.  All  truth  is  unified  and  centres  in 
God. 

The  conclusion  of  the  whole  chapter  is  this : 
That  education  as  an  uplifter,  that  art  in  its  various 
forms,  and  that  literature,  in  its  profusion,  are  all 
broadening,  enlightening  and  Christianizing  the 
human  mind ;  that  the  spirit  of  invention,  and  in- 
vention itself,  is  inspiring  and  leading  the  world ; 
that  science  is  unfolding  the  works  of  God  and 
bringing  nature  and  religion  into  a  common  fold ; 
and,  finally,  that  all  these  influences  combined  with 
others,  are  drawing  the  Church  and  the  world  out 
of  their  narrowness  and  selfishness,  throu^-h  an 
open  door,  into  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom,  w^here 
God  shall  be  all  in  all,  and  Jesus  shall  see  of  the 
travail  of  His  soul  and  be  satisfied.     A  long  time 


174  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

may  pass  before  the  world  reaches  its  goal.  Evolu- 
tionary advances  move  slowly, — but  they  move; 
and  the  universality  of  the  kingdom  is  as  certain  as 
that  God  is  God.  When  the  Gospel  of  the  Church 
and  the  Gospel  of  the  Kingdom  become  one,  joined 
together  in  holy  wedlock,  then  the  day  of  the 
world's  redemption  draweth  nigh. 


X. 

ALL  THE  EELIGIOISrS  OF  THE  WORLD  TO 

BE  UNIFIED  AND  HAEMONIZED  IN 

THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM, 


X. 

ALL  THE  RELIGIOTTS  OF  THE  WORLD  TO  BE  UNI- 
FIED AND  HARMONIZED  IN  THE  GOSPEL  OF 
THE   KINGDOM. 

The  history  of  religion  as  it  has  existed  in  the 
world,  and  in  the  hearts  and  lives  of  all  men  from 
the  beginning,  has  never  been  written.  It  never 
can  be  fully  written, — partly  because  of  the  vast- 
ness  of  the  subject ;  partly  because  no  man  is  so 
free  from  prepossessions  and  prejudices  as  would 
enable  him  to  write  with  perfect  fairness  and  lucid- 
ity, upon  every  aspect  of  the  great  subject;  and 
partly,  because  true  religion  is  so  personal,  and  so 
much  of  the  heart  rather  than  of  the  lip,  that  out- 
side reporters  cannot  discover  its  best  qualities  and 
reduce  them  to  writing.  Good  people  are  always 
shy  about  opening  their  inner  lives  to  the  inspection 
of  the  outside  world. 

As  man's  moral  nature  is  the  highest  and  noblest 
part  of  our  common  humanity,  so,  religion  is  the 
deepest  and  best  of  all  earthly  experiences.  The 
body  has  its  physical  necessities;   the  intellect  of 

177 


178  THE  GOSPEL  OF  TEE  KINGDOM. 

man  requires  cultivation  and  enlargement  through 
discipline  and  the  acquisition  of  knowledge ;  but 
man's  moral  nature  that  allies  him  to  God,  and 
through  which  he  knows  God  and  truth  and  duty, 
is  the  seat  of  religion.  True  religion  is  worship,  is 
service  of  God  and  man,  is  good-will,  and  therefore, 
it  must  be  higher  and  more  sacred  than  any  physical 
good,  and  growth  of  intellect,  apart  by  themselves, 
can  be.  This  explains  why  religion  is  the  one 
fundamental  and  universal  fact  in  the  world's  his- 
tory. The  nature  of  man  necessitates  religion  and 
clothes  it  with  a  sacredness  and  power  that  are  never 
absent,  and  which  nothing  else  can  give  or  take 
away. 

And  yet,  religion  more  than  anything  else,  unless 
it  be  the  vaultings  of  human  ambition,  has  been 
the  great  subject  of  contention  and  division  among 
men.  People  always  strive  most  about  things  that 
are  dearest  to  them,  and  which  they  most  value. 
At  first  glance,  and  even  on  closer  observation,  it 
would  seem  that  the  world  is  full  of  religions,  all 
different  in  kind,  and  each  clashing  with  the  other. 
The  adherents  of  every  religion  think  their  own 
the  best  and  purest  of  all,  at  least,  for  those  who 
embrace  it,  if  not  for  the  whole  world.  There  are 
lords  many  and  gods  many ;  and  religion  seems  to 


ALL  THE  RELIGIONS  TO  BE  UNIFIED.  179 

be  as  diversified  as  are  the  different  classes  and 
races  of  men.  Even  among  believers  in  the  same 
system  of  religion,  there  often  exist  broad  differ- 
ences of  opinion,  and  divisions  into  sects  and  sec- 
tarian strifes,  seemingly  without  limit.  This  is  not 
only  true  of  one  system  of  religion,  but  of  every 
system.  All  this  goes  to  show  that  the  work  of 
evolutionary  creation  is  not  yet  completed,  that 
religion  is  still  in  its  inchoate  state  ;  but  that  all 
religions,  high  and  low,  are  a  search  after  God,  and 
are  leading  directly  or  indirectly  away  from  earth 
and  self,  towards  and  into  the  infinite  and  eternal, 
where  alone  the  spirit  of  man  can  find  rest. 

And  yet,  this  apparent  diversity  and  contradic- 
tion that  we  seem  to  find  in  the  religions  of  man- 
kind are  more  seeming,  more  superficial  and  unim- 
portant than  most  people  suppose  them  to  be.  A 
mere  surface  view  sees  little  in  common  and  much 
in  discord.  To  some  minds,  when  glancing  over 
the  field  of  the  world,  the  whole  question  of  relig- 
ion seems  to  be  one  of  mystery,  of  uncertainty,  of 
superstition  and  of  endless  contradictions  that  have 
but  little,  if  any  foundation  in  reality ;  and  so,  they 
are  at  times  inclined  to  cast  off  the  whole  subject 
as  not  worthy  of  serious  attention.  And  yet,  how- 
ever men  may  wish  to  think  and  do  this,  the  thing 


180  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

is  impossible  ;  for  there  is  something  that  God  has 
put  in  every  human  soul  which  tells  him  that 
religion  is  a  deep  and  divine  reality.  It  is  some- 
thing that  finds  and  holds  him,  struggle  with  or 
against,  as  he  may. 

Eeligion  is  not  that  contradictory  and  superficial 
thing  that,  viewed  casually,  it  often  seems  to  be. 
As  to  fundamental  and  essential  facts,  all  the  relig- 
ions of  the  world,  great  and  small,  evolved  or 
spiritually  revealed,  historic  or  otherwise,  are  essen- 
tially one  and  inseparable.  Their  differences  relate 
to  the  scaffolding  that  has  been  built  up  around 
them,  to  the  wood,  hay  and  stubble  that  ignorance 
and  tradition  have  wrought  in  with  the  precious 
stones  and  pure  gold.  We  have  only  to  cast  off 
these  useless  and  hurtful  encumbrances  and  we 
shall  find  that  the  heart  of  every  religion  is  true  to 
the  heart  of  every  other.  In  non-essentials,  they 
differ ;  in  essentials,  they  hold  together  as  a  mani- 
fold cord  that  cannot  be  broken.  Let  the  correct- 
ness of  this  statement  now  be  tested. 

We  have  three  things  to  consider,  so  far  as  space 
permits :  1.  The  peoples  of  the  world  in  their 
relations  to  religion.  2.  The  religions  which  they 
profess  and  illustrate,  and  3.  The  relation  of  these 
religions  to  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom. 


ALL  THE  RELIGIONS  TO  BE  UNIFIED.  181 

If  we  look  back  to  the  dawn  of  history,  we  meet 
with  the  Egyptians,  the  Babylonians,  the  Assyri- 
ans, the  Aryans,  and  other  peoples  who  lie  more  in 
the  myths  of  uncertainty.  However  they  severally 
differ  in  other  respects,  they  all  come  together  in 
the  one  great  fact  of  earnest  religiousness.  Their 
religions  differ  widely  in  many  things,  but  still, 
they  are  religions  that  the  people  of  all  classes  love 
and  cherish,  and  for  which,  if  need  be,  they  would 
lay  down  their  lives.  All  these  nations  have  their 
sacred  writings,  many  of  them  brief,  and  graven  on 
bricks,  tiles  and  stones ;  they  have  their  priests  and 
teachers,  their  temples  and  altars,  their  services 
and  sacrifices,  and  their  religious  rites  at  the  burial 
of  the  dead.  Doubtless  there  were  irreligious  and 
profane  people  in  those  days,  and  unbelievers,  as 
there  have  been  in  every  age  and  nation  since  their 
day.  Selfishness  abounded  then,  as  now.  In  that 
remote  and  early  period  people  were  not  exempt 
from  ignorance,  error,  superstition  and  general 
wickedness,  any  more,  or  as  much,  as  they  are  now. 
One  religion  is  apt  to  judge  another,  not  by  its  ex- 
cellences, but  by  the  evils  with  which  it  is  more  or 
less  associated.  Tried  by  this  unfair  standpoint, 
and  every  religion,  Christianity  not  excepted,  is 
doomed.     The  only  point  I  now  make  is,  that  the 


182  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGD03L 

people  of  those  early  nations  were,  according  to 
the  light  they  had,  truly  and  earnestly  religious. 

If  we  come  down  to  later  times,  we  meet  the 
Greeks  of  different  names,  whose  philosophers 
taught  religion,  whose  art,  of  the  highest  order, 
was  an  expression  of  religious  thought  and  feeling, 
and  whose  altars  and  temples  are  standing  monu- 
ments of  their  sacrifices  and  devotion  to  their  gods. 
Of  the  ancient  Eomans,  almost  the  same  words 
may  be  spoken.  Their  reverence  for  law  was  an 
element  of  their  religion. 

Turn  now  to  the  living  peoples  of  Asia,  as  the 
western  world  has  come  to  know  them  in  the  last 
century.  The  Japanese,  the  Chinese  and  the  peo- 
ple of  India  are  more  religious  in  their  way — and 
they  have  much  in  common — than  are  the  people 
of  almost  any  Christian  land.  Their  civilization  is 
wholly  different  from  ours.  They  care  less  for 
material  things,  they  search  less  into  the  areana  of 
nature,  they  are  less  rich  and  enterprising,  but  they 
worship  their  noble  ancestors,  they  think  of  God 
and  duty,  and  of  great  teachers,  inspired  men  as 
they  believe,  who  were  forgetful  of  themselves  and 
of  the  world,  and  were  absorbed  in  a  conscious 
sense  of  God's  immanence  in  whom  they  lived  and 
moved  and  had  their  being. 


ALL  THE  RELIGIONS  TO  BE  UNIFIED.  183 

Of  the  Mahometan  world  it  may  be  said,  that  if 
the  people  are  not  religious,  they  are  not  anything ; 
and  they  are  not  ashamed  of  their  religion.  AVatch 
them,  wherever  they  may  be,  as,  at  the  hour  and 
call  for  prayer,  they  prostrate  themselves  in  devout 
worship.  If  there  be  another  side  to  their  char- 
acter, as  most  people  have  more  than  one  side,  this 
does  not  change  the  fact  of  their  religious  devotion, 
and  of  their  devotion  to  religion.  I  need  not  char- 
acterize Christian  nations.  We  know  Avhat  they 
are  to  their  credit  and  to  their  discredit.  It  is 
enough  to  say  that  religion  dwells  among  them, 
and  that  there  are  millions  of  devout  worshipers. 
It  is  needless  to  go  further  to  establish  the  great 
fact  that  religion  is  a  characteristic  of  mankind. 
Man  must  worship ;  God  is  in  his  nature  and  must, 
in  some  degree,  be  recognized  and  adored. 

We  come  now  to  inquire  into  the  nature  of  the 
religions  that  prevail  among  the  nations  of  the 
earth,  past  and  present.  Among  them.  Monothe- 
ism, Fetichism,  Parse  or  Mageanism,  Buddhism, 
Brahmanism,  Polytheism,  Judaism,  Islamism  and 
the  Christianity  of  the  Greek,  Koman  Catholic 
and  Protestant  Churches  hold  prominent  posi- 
tions.    It   is  not   intended,  nor   is  it  necessary  to 


184  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM, 

mj  present  purpose,  that  these  religions  should 
each  be  studied  separately.  The  great  point  I 
make  is  that,  however  much  they  may  diflPer 
in  unimportant  and  secondary  matters,  they  all 
contain  and  emphasize  most  of  the  central  prin- 
ciples and  truths,  imperfectly  I  admit,  that  must 
enter  into  and  constitute  the  one  universal  religion 
that  constitutes  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom,  which 
is,  some  day,  to  prevail  in  all  the  earth.  Let  me 
particularize : 

1.  All  these  religions  recognize  and  teach  the 
existence  of  one  supreme  Being  whom  Christians 
call  God.  This  conviction  is  the  foundation  on 
which  all  religion  rests.  Of  course,  it  is  not  meant 
that  all  of  these  religions,  or  that  any  of  them, 
fully  comprehend  God.  The  infinite  is  incompre- 
hensible to  finite  beings,  except  in  some  negative  or 
partial  sense.  This  fact  explains  the  crude  and 
wrong  notions  that  have  prevailed,  and  do  still,  as 
to  the  nature  and  character  of  God.  It  explains 
why  men  and  religions  have  tried  to  find  God  by 
conceiving  of  Him  as  existing  in  finite  forms,  or  as 
being  represented  in  them.  Sometimes  God  is 
personated  in  the  heavenly  bodies,  at  others,  in 
heroes  and  great  ancestors  ;  sometimes  in  rivers,  in 
animals,  and  even,  in  blocks  of  wood  and  stone,  and 


ALL  THE  RELIGIONS  TO  BE  UNIFIED.  185 

in  pictures,  as  in  some  parts  of  Christendom.  But 
the  thing  to  be  kept  in  mind  is  that,  through  it  all, 
the  Infinite  One  is  recognized  in  every  religion  of 
the  world,  and,  according  to  the  light  men  have, 
God  is  feared  and  adored,  if  not  obeyed.  On  this 
central  fact  of  the  universe,  all  men  with  insignifi- 
cant exceptions,  stand  on  common  ground. 

2.  All  religions  not  only  have  some  code  of 
morals,  of  ethical  duties,  which  they  deem  to  be 
obligatory,  but,  to  a  great  extent  they  all  have  the 
same  and  a  common  code.  Jesus  was  the  best  and 
the  profoundest  ethical  teacher  the  world  has  ever 
known ;  yet,  there  is  not,  probably,  a  precept  upon 
man's  duties  to  his  fellow-man,  in  the  four  gospels, 
that  is  not  duplicated,  in  word,  or  in  substance,  in 
the  teachings  of  all,  or  nearly  all,  of  the  historic  re- 
ligions that  lie  outside  of  Christendom.  These 
precepts  are,  it  is  true,  often  mixed  in  with  other 
things  that,  to  us,  seem  puerile  and  very  faulty ;  but 
we  must  allow  for  the  age,  and  darkness  of  the  age, 
in  which  they  were  written ;  and  we  must  remem- 
ber also,  that  if  the  Christian  religion  were  to  be 
judged  by  all  the  absurd  things  that,  at  times,  have 
been  fastened  upon  it,  it  would  fare  as  badly  at  the 
hands  of  Orientalists  as  their  ethics  do  at  ours.  AYe 
are  to  judge  of  religions  as  of  men,  not  by  their  worst 


186  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGD02,I. 

but  by  their  better  features,  a  lesson  that  Christians 
need  often  to  learn  in  dealing  with  religions  and 
people  other  than  their  own. 

3.  All  religions  have  more  than  an  ethical 
basis ;  they  are  religions,  and  not  mere  intellections 
or  formulas  of  morality.  Most  of  them  have  their 
sacred  books,  written  by  inspired  men,  as  they  be- 
lieve ;  Buddha,  Zoroaster  and  Confucius  are  ex- 
amples. They  hold  these  writings  to  be  as  sacred 
as  we  do  our  Bible ;  and  rightly  they  resent  igno- 
rant attacks  upon  them,  as  if  the  devil  were  their 
author. 

In  addition  to  teachers  and  books,  all  these  re- 
ligions have  shrines,  altars,  temples,  sacrifices  and 
holy  services,  that  are  as  real  and  sacred  to  them 
as  corresponding  things  are  to  Christian  people. 
They  believe  in  the  awful  fact  of  sin,  in  the  need  of 
repentance,  of  trust  in  God,  in  the  law  of  love,  and 
in  good  works,  as  we  do  ;  and  it  is  possible  to  find 
as  devout  and  holy  men  and  women  in  the  Orient 
as  Christian  culture  has  produced.  They  are  not  as 
learned  in  many  ways,  and  they  may  have  things 
clinging  to  them  which  we  could  wish  were  not  there; 
but  their  simplicity  of  character,  heart  sincerity  and 
purity  of  purpose,  can  only  be  questioned  by  ignorance 
or  by  men  of  Pharisaic  integrity.    Much  of  the  world 


ALL  THE  RELIGIONS  TO  BE  UNIFIED.  187 

that  lies  outside  of  Christendom  is  more  religious, 
and  more  bold  and  outspoken  in  its  devotional 
services,  than  is  the  greater  part  of  the  Christian 
world;  and  if  we  compare  the  best  of  one  class 
with  the  poorest  of  the  other,  it  would  be  hard  to 
decide  where  superstition  and  ignorance  most 
abounded.  It  is  a  better  religion,  rather  than  more 
of  it,  that  is  most  needed. 

4.  In  particular,  all  religions  teach  alike  the  car- 
dinal doctrine  of  life  after  death.  It  is  in  human 
nature,  in  instinct  and  in  intuition  to  believe  this. 
Necessarily,  all  people  have  vague  and  crude  ideas 
as  to  what  the  future  world  is  like ;  it  lies  outside 
the  testimony  of  our  senses.  We  have  nothing  to 
compare  it  with ;  and  if  we  try  to  form  definite 
conclusions  about  many  things,  we  are  only  dream- 
ing and  romancing,  instead  of  standing  on  any  re- 
liable evidence.  This  explains  why  it  is  that,  in  all 
lands.  Christian  and  otherwise,  there  is  so  much  of 
extravagance  connected  with  the  conception  of  life 
after  death.  Men  have  no  real  data  for  their  con- 
clusions. But  this  does  not  change  the  main  fact 
that  all  religions,  and  their  adherents,  believe  alike, 
and  with  confidence,  that  when  the  body  dies  the 
spirit  goes  from  it  and  lives  on  in  the  spirit  Avorld. 
Some  of  the  ablest  arguments  for  immortality  have 


188  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

been  written  by  men  who  lived  before  Christianity 
was  born.  Socrates,  Plato  and  Cicero  are  shinins: 
examples.     Death  is  but  a  change  in  life. 

5.  Once  more :  All  religions  teach  that  char- 
acter and  condition  are  inseparable.  Holiness  is 
allied  to  happiness,  and  sin  to  misery,  by  the 
changeless  law  of  necessar^^  sequence.  If  only  the 
nature  of  true  happiness,  and  of  real  misery  is 
rightly  understood,  this  law  obtains  alike  in  this 
world  and  that  which  is  to  come.  The  seen  and 
the  unseen  are  closely  allied.  The  good  are  blessed 
and  the  bad  are  cursed ;  it  is  so  in  the  nature  of 
things,  wherever  moral  beings  exist.  This  general 
statement  all  religions  teach,  and  religionists  of 
every  sort  believe  in  their  hearts,  and  are  ready  to 
confess.  They  would  be  false  to  themselves,  to 
God  and  the  universe,  if  they  did  otherwise. 

The  above  specifications,  while  they  are  not  ex- 
haustive of  religious  truth,  involve  the  great  under- 
lying doctrines  of  the  universal  religion.  They  are 
not  exhaustive  of  Christianity,  l^early  every  relig- 
ion has  some  characteristic  of  its  own.  That  which 
differentiates  the  Christian  religion  from  every 
other  is  Jesus  Christ,  and  that  fulness  of  grace  and 
truth  and  life  that  come  to  the  world  through  Him 
more  than  through  any  other.     Christ's  gospel  of 


ALL  THE  RELIGIONS  TO  BE  UNIFIED.  189 

the  kingdom  contains  the  truths  and  influences  that 
must  enter  into,  and  dominate  the  religions  of  the 
world.  Jesus  revealed  God  as  a  God  of  love,  and 
also,  in  His  fatherly  relations  to  man ;  He  revealed 
the  fact  and  extent  of  human  brotherhood,  and  ex- 
pounded the  law  of  love  as  the  central  principle  of 
the  moral  universe ;  and  these  are  surely  the  cen- 
tral truths  of  the  universal  religion,  that  are  no- 
where else  revealed  as  in  the  gospel  of  Christ's 
kingdom,  and  without  which  a  religion  suited  to 
the  whole  human  race  is  impossible. 

It  is  indeed  the  personality  of  Jesus  Christ, — 
His  personality  impressed  upon  the  whole  Christian 
world, — that  mainly  constitutes  Christianity  and 
makes  it  what  it  is.  Take  Christ  out  of  the  system 
and  what  would  then  be  left  ?  His  is  an  ideal 
character  which  has  not  only  held  its  place  in  the 
moral  firmament  through  all  the  Christian  centuries, 
but  has  been  ever  growing  in  brilliancy  and  power, 
until  now.  His  influence  in  the  whole  religious 
world,  and  in  the  department  of  advanced  civiliza- 
tion is  greater  than  that  of  the  founders  of  all  other 
religions  and  philosophies  combined.  Buddha, 
Zoroaster,  Confucius,  Mahomet  and  the  philosophers 
of  Greece  and  Kome  were  noble  characters,  and  they 
established  religions  that  embody  much  of  truth  ; 


190  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

but  their  own  personalities  are  not  essential  to  the 
systems  they  represent,  as  Christ's  personality  is 
essential  to  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom  of  which  He 
is  the  centre,  soul  and  life.  Take  Jesus  out  of  the 
gospel,  and  I  repeat,  there  would  be  but  little  left 
to  distinguish  it  from  other  historic  religions  older 
than  Christianity  and,  perhaps,  of  larger  following, 
but  which  have  never  succeeded  in  uplifting  the 
world.  Jesus  Christ  is  the  ideal  character  for  all 
ages.  What  He  has  been  in  the  past.  He  will  con- 
tinue to  be  in  the  future,  except  that,  as  the  world 
advances  towards  the  universal  religion.  His  in- 
fluence will  steadily  increase;  and  when  the  uni- 
versal religion  and  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom  are 
merged  in  a  common  unity,  it  will  still  be  found 
that  Jesus  Christ  is  the  sun  and  centre  around 
whom  all  peoples  will  gather  and  before  whom  all 
knees  will  bow  as  being  the  foremost  revealer  of 
God  to  man,  of  man  to  himself,  and  of  that  life 
eternal  which  is  the  hope  and  final  destiny  of  mankind . 
And  yet,  every  religion  has  some  real  contribu- 
tion to  the  great  result  towards  which  the  world  is 
moving,  and  every  religion,  as  men  now  see  it,  has 
much  useless  and  harmful  material  to  throw  off,  as 
well  as  much  to  conserve.  The  loss  and  the  ffain 
come  from  every  side.     The  gospel  of  the  kingdom, 


ALL    THE  RELIGIONS  TO  BE  UNIFIED.  191 

I  repeat,  has  more  to  give,  than  it  has  to  receive ; 
because,  in  addition  to  greater  knowledge,  greater 
energy,  and  a  clearer  vision  of  duty,  it  has  the 
Christ  of  God,  His  personality.  His  life.  His  teach- 
ings, His  promises  and  His  spirit,  to  pour  into  the 
religions  and  the  heart  of  the  world  ;  so  that  in  the 
final  adjustment,  when  all  religions  shall  have  their 
just  dues,  and  are  merged  and  harmonized  in  a  com- 
mon system,  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom  will  be 
paramount,  will  be  found  to  include  what  is  good 
in  all  the  others,  and  will  have  the  Avilling  and  uni- 
versal acceptance  of  mankind. 

But  before  this  great  day  arrives,  there  will  be 
masterful  struggle  with  environment.  The  process 
must  be  a  steady  growth,  not  one  sharp  battle, — a 
victory  and  a  conquest.  In  this  struggle,  the  his- 
toric religions  will  vie  with  each  other,  and  do  it 
honestly,  for  the  mastery.  The  gospel  will  be  car- 
ried to  every  land;  and  the  religions  outside  of 
Christendom,  believing  that  they  have  sometliing 
to  give,  as  well  as  to  receive,  will  set  up  their  ban- 
ners in  Christian  communities,  as  they  are  now  do- 
ing in  New  York  city  and  elsewhere,  to  preach  the 
doctrine  of  divine  immanence  and  kindred  truths  as 
held  by  themselves,  and  held  as  being  an  advance 
upon  Christian  teachings  on  the  same  subjects. 


192  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

Thus,  from  all  sides  the  movement  will  go  on  as 
it  is  now  going ;  one  worse  than  useless  element 
will  be  dropped  here,  and  another  there ;  denomi- 
nations and  religions  will  come  to  understand  each 
other  better,  will  be  drawn  into  closer  relationships, 
will  find  that  they  have,  after  all,  a  common  cause, 
and  that  division  is  a  source  of  weakness,  that  in 
union  is  strength,  that  God  in  Christ  is  drawing  all 
men,  and  all  they  possess,  into  the  gospel  of  the 
kingdom !  Then  will  the  struggle  cease,  harmony 
will  be  restored,  the  world  saved  and  God's  purpose 
be  consummated.  Towards  this  evolutionary  re- 
sult all  things  are  now  tending,  and  the  kingdom  is 
the  goal. 


XI. 

THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM  ON  EAETH 
AjS  it  is  m  HEAVEN. 


XL 

THE   GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM  ON  EARTH  AS  IT  IS 
IN  HEAVEN. 

"When  a  thoughtful  traveler  approaches,  for  the 
first  time,  some  imposing  scene  in  nature, — the 
Niagara  Falls,  the  Yosemite  Yalley,  the  ''  Garden 
of  the  Gods,"  the  Golden  Gate,  the  Gorge  of  Phef- 
fers,  or  some  snow-capped  mountain  range, — he  in- 
stinctively pauses,  as  if  on  holy  ground,  that  he 
may  be  prepared  to  comprehend,  appreciate  and  de- 
scribe the  great  scene  that  is  opening  before  him. 
So,  the  aged  man,  after  a  long  and  eventful  life, 
when  he  finds  himself  standing  on  the  verge  of  two 
worlds,  glancing  back  over  the  past,  and  gleaming 
into  the  unseen  beyond,  comes  to  a  solemn  pause, 
that  he  may  gain  strength  and  preparation  for  the 
discoveries  and  glories  that  await  his  vision.  If,  in 
imagination,  one  were  permitted  to  look  off  upon 
this  world  and  beyond,  into  heaven,  and  discover 
that  the  kingdom  had  come  alike  in  both,  what  a 
field  of  revelation  and  of  wonders  would  come  into 
view! 

195 


196  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

First  of  all  he  would  be  amazed  at  the  wonderful 
changes  that  had  come  over  the  whole  earth ;  and 
almost  equally,  because  of  striking  likenesses  be- 
tween the  two  worlds.  Heaven  itself  would  be  an 
amazement  to  him,  as  it  will  be  to  all  of  us  when 
we  enter  it  from  our  earthly  homes.  At  first,  no 
one  thing  in  particular  would  strike  his  vision,  for 
all  things  would  have  been  made  new ;  the  holy 
city  would  have  come  down  out  of  heaven,  and 
there  would  be  a  new  heaven  and  a  new  earth,  and 
God's  tabernacle  would  be  with  men.  Old  things 
would  then  have  passed  avf ay,  and  all  that  the  eye 
could  rest  upon  would  seem  as  strange  and  wonder- 
ful as  they  were  new.  He  would  see  that  the  end 
for  which  the  human  race  was  created,  but  which 
had  been  veiled  from  view,  had  now,  indeed,  come. 
Many  great  problems  that  were  once  thought  to  be 
insolvable,  will  then  have  reached  solution.  The 
mystery  of  moral  evil,  of  human  struggle  and  of 
slow  progress  will  then  be  explained.  The  intel- 
lectual world  may  not  be  disentangled  from  error, 
and  the  search  after  truth  may  be  intensified ;  but 
the  moral  and  spiritual  world  will  be  at  rest,  be- 
cause of  the  love  and  unfaltering  trust  that  will 
then  everywhere  prevail. 

IS"ot  only  will  this  earth  and  /the  life  upon  it,  in 


ON  EARTH  AS  IT  IS  IN  HEA  VEN.  197 

that  day,  appear  in  a  new  light,  but  heaven  itself 
of  which  this  world  will  then  be  the  counterpart, 
will  have  emerged  from  the  mists  that  now  envelop 
it,  into  the  light  of  almost  clear  vision.  We  shall 
then  have  a  new  heaven  as  well  as  a  new  earth. 

One  of  the  first  great  facts  then  to  be  established 
beyond  doubt,  will  be  the  cardinal  fact  of  continued 
conscious  life  after  physical  death.  "While  a  gen- 
eral belief  has  ever  prevailed  that  death  "  does  not 
end  all,"  yet  this  conclusion  has  never  had  the 
support  of  scientific,  or  of  demonstrated  certainty. 
Men  have  tried  to  prove  what,  by  argument  was 
never  satisfactorily  proven,  and  by  that  process 
alone,  never  can  be.  \  Only  a  clear  consciousness  of 
God  and  of  life  in  Him,  such  as  will  be  general 
when  the .  gospel  of  the  kingdom  is  established  on 
earth  as  it  is  in  heaven,  can  give  assurance  of 
eternal  life.  In  this  life,  and  in  the  ethereal  world 
alike,  the  proof  of  immortality  is  a  vital  union  and 
oneness  with  God  as  He  is  revealed  to  us  in  Jesus 
Christ.  All  this  is  clearly  apprehended  in  heaven, 
and  it  will  be  on  earth,  when  heaven  and  earth  be- 
come one  in  thought,  feeling,  purpose  and  life ;  as, 
in  that  "  good  time  coming  "  they  will  be. 

And  yet,  in  one  respect,  at  least,  heaven  and 
earth  must  ever  widely  differ.     In  this  world,  as 


198  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

we  have  seen, .physical  life  abounds,  and  in  the 
ethereal  world,  spiritual  life  superabounds ;  and  the 
two  are  widely  different.  Here,  we  have  each  of 
us  two  bodies,  a  physical  and  a  spiritual,  one  dwell- 
ing in  the  other ;  and  that  change  which  we  call 
.death  relates  to  the  physical  body  only.  The 
spirit  never  dies;  it  only  changes  habitation  and 
environments.  Heaven  and  earth  are  nearer  each 
other  than  we  think.  Heaven  is  more  an  experience 
than  a  place,  so  that  when  the  spirit  rises  above  the 
body  and  lives  with  and  in  God,  there  is  heaven, 
whether  it  be  on  earth  or  beyond.  Still,  physical 
nature,  however  sanctified,  is  physical  and  not 
ethereal ;  it  is  a  thing  of  sense,  the  shadow  of  things 
to  come. 

This  distinction  between  the  two  worlds,— of 
body  and  spirit, — is  so  fundamental  that  we  cannot 
reason  from  one  to  the  other,  as  otherwise  might 
be  possible.  General  facts  and  principles  apply  to 
all  moral  beings  wherever  they  exist.  Beyond  this, 
we  on  earth  have  no  data,  no  clearly  defined  ideals 
that  enable  us  fully  to  map  out  and  describe  the 
spirit  world  ;  and  when  we  try  to  do  so,'  we  make 
it  physical  and  not  spiritual,  and  so  we  mistake 
imagination  for  reality. 

But  this  one  fundamental  point  of  difference  be- 


ON  EARTH  AS  IT  IS  IN  HEA  VEN.  199 

t ween  earth  redeemed  from  sin,  and  heaven,  must  not 
be  so  magnified  as  to  shut  out  from  view  great 
matters  in  which  the  two  worlds  will  then  be 
essentially  alike.  God  is  the  central  fact,  the  all 
and  in  all  of  both  worlds.  What  the  light  of  the 
sun  is  to  this  earth,  God  is  to  heaven,  and  would  be 
to  us,  if  we  had  heavenly  vision.  How  the  spirits 
of  the  just  made  perfect  see  God,  we  do  not  know. 
Physical  eyes  like  ours  they  cannot  possess,  but 
they  have  a  spiritual  vision  that  far  exceeds  human 
capability.  Man  has,  I  believe,  in  this  life,  some 
rudimental  elements  of  spiritual  vision,  and  it  is 
through  this  occult  power,  partially  developed,  that 
some  persons  on  earth  see  God  and  have  heavenly 
visions.  When  the  kingdom  comes  on  earth  as  it  is 
in  heaven,  it  is  probable  that  the  vision  of  saints 
below,  and  of  saints  above,  will  be  more  alike  than 
they  are  now.  At  any  rate,  in  both  worlds,  God 
will  then  be  the  one  great  personality,  of  whom  all 
will  be  conscious,  and  whom  they  will  adore  and 
serve  as  the  sum  and  source  of  all  good.  -  His  will 
is  their  law. 

This  brings  me  to  say  that  in  heaven,  and  on 
earth,  when  it  becomes  heavenly,  something  in  the 
nature  of  law  and  government  will  still  exist. 
Government,  as  we  now  see  and  understand  it,  is 


SOO  TH^  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

unknown  in  heaven,  and  when  earth  and  heaven 
are  one  in  spirit  and  in  life,  government,  in  its  pres- 
ent form,  will  be  unknown  everywhere.  The  one 
eternal  law  of  the  moral  universe,  and  so  of  heaven 
and  earth,  is  the  ^  law  of  love.  Around  this  one 
commandment,— Thou  shalt  love  the  Lord  thy  God 

.  with  all  thy  heart  and  thy  neighbor  as  thyself, — all 
true  and  enduring  government  centres.  Love  is 
the  fulfilling  of  the  law.  He  that  loveth  is  born  of 
God  and  knoweth  God.  He  that  loveth  not  is  of 
the  devil. 

Doubtless,  in  heaven  there  are  simple  and  natural 
arrangements  for  different  classes  of  service,  and 
for  the  orderly  carrying  out  of  the  law  of  love. 

\  On  earth,  when  the  kingdom  shall  have  come,  it 
will  be  essentially  the  same.  Such  orderly  arrange- 
ments as  the  law  of  love  may  suggest,  or  make  neces- 
sary, will  be  established  and  observed.  But  every 
organization  and  operation  that  is  based  on  selfish- 
ness, or  that  selfishness  demands,  will  have  passed 
away.  This  means  that  the  whole  world  will  be 
one ;  that  national  antagonisms,  if  not  their  separate 
existence,  that  all  war  measures,  all  protective 
tariffs,  all  gigantic  monopolies,  and  everything  not 
in  harmony  with  the  law  of  love  will  have  passed 
away,  and  that  such  government  as  remains  will  be 


OK  EABTS  AS  IT  IS  IN  HEA  VEN.  201 

heavenly ;  that  is  to  say,  it  will  be  a  government  of 
love  and  nothing  else. 

This  is  not  to  claim  that  in  the  great  day  com- 
ing, when  love  is  law  and  law  is  love,  that  there 
will  not  remain,  both  on  earth  and  in  heaven,  large 
fields  of  ignorance,  of  mystery,  and  of  consequent 
mistaken  apprehension.  Perfectness  of  love  which 
is  the  only  perfection  possible  to  finite  beings,  does 
not  mean  perfectness  of  judgment ;  if  it  did,  then  it 
would  mean  omniscience,  which  is  an  attribute  of 
God  only.  Doubtless,  in  heaven  knowledge  will  be 
more  extensive  than  it  ever  can  be  in  this  world. 
Some  persons  appear  to  think  that  there  can  be  no 
ignorance,  no  real  mystery,  and  no  mistake  in 
heaven.  Far  otherwise.  The  highest  archangel 
knows  infinitely  less  than  infinite,  and,  conse- 
quently, in  many  directions  must  be  in  attitudes  of 
uncertainty  and  of  profound  mystery. 

If  this  be  true  in  heaven,  how  much  more  must 
it  be  true  on  earth,  even  in  the  light  of  the  king- 
dom. The  advance  in  knowledge  that  has  come  to 
men  in  the  last  one  thousand,  or  even,  one  hundred 
years  is  immense ;  and,  as  the  world  moves  on 
towards  the  kingdom  it  will  increase  more  and 
more.  When  prejudice  and  prepossession  shall 
have  disappeared  and  when  all  men  shall  become 


202  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

honest  and  earnest  seekers  after  truth,  and  in  all 
directions,  and  for  the  sake  of  the  general  good,  as 
they  will  do  in  the  kingdom,  then,  as  compared 
with  now,  the  world  will  be  full  of  light  on  all  sub- 
jects. And  yet,  even  then,  science  will  be  only  in 
the  vestibule  of  God's  infinite  temple  of  living 
truth.  Then,  as  now,  in  directions  where  it  might 
seem  that  all  darkness  had  fled  away,  a  deeper  in- 
sight into  mystery  would  reveal  the  shallowness  of 
human  knowledge. 

If  knowledge  is  to  be  limited  in  heaven  and  on 
earth,  when  earth  becomes  heavenly,  then  in  both 
worlds  there  must  be  wide  differences  of  opinion, 
and  earnest  discussion  on  many  great  questions. 
There  and  then,  as  here  and  now,  the  same  subject 
will  be  seen  by  men  and  angels  from  different 
points  of  view ;  and  although  both  sides  may  be 
partly  right  and  partly  wrong,  they  must,  of  ne- 
cessity, often  reach  different  conclusions.  What 
may  seem  truth  to  one,  may  be  the  opposite  of 
truth  to  another ;  and  so  very  earnest  and  pro- 
longed discussions  and  differences  of  opinion  may 
exist  in  heaven. 

But  such  disagreements  would  not  be  conducted 
as  they  now  are  on  earth.  The  disputants  there, 
and  in  both  worlds,  are  sanctified  beings ;  they  live 


ON  EAETH  AS  IT  IS  IN  HE  A  VEN.  203 

up  to  the  light  that  is  given  them,  and^^^lie  law  of 
love  rules  every  heart,  so  that  differences^  do  not 
beget'  alienation,  strife,  and  division  into  parties 
and  sects,  as  they  do  here.  There  is  no  denomina- 
tionalism  or  sectarianism  in  heaven,  and  there  will 
be  none  on  earth,  when  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom 
comes  on  earth  as  it  is  in  heaven.  vCnity  of  spirit, 
/oneness  with  God,  and  a  life  of  love, — these,  and 
not  uniformity  of  belief,  even  upon  great  subjects, 
are  what  make  heaven  harmonious  and  fill  it  with 
the  divine  fullness.  Were  it  otherwise,  even 
heaven  itself  would  be  a  place  of  discord.  So  long 
as  finite  beings  are  finite,  there  must  be  among 
them,  if  they  are  reflective  and  progressive,  di- 
vergencies of  thought  and  conclusion.  In  the 
nature  of  things  it  cannot  be  otherwise. 

If  all  this  be  accepted  as  true,  then  it  follows    ^ 
that  the  standard  of  estimate  in  heaven  and  on  ,  ^ 
earth   w^hen  the    kingdom   is   established   here   as  ,.iC 
there,  must  be  very  different  from  the  standards    lA 
that  now,  with  us,  are  for  the  most  part  used  to 
measure  values.     With  us,  money  or  its  equivalent 
is  the  chief  standard  of  measurement.     One  rich 
man    outweighs    a    hundred   of    the    unfortunate 
poor.     If   one   wishes   to   know   the   value   of   his 
neighbor,  he  asks.  How  much  is  he  worth?  and 


204  THE  GOSPEL  OE  THE  KINGDOM. 

if  he  is  woi'tli  a  million  dollars,  or  only  one  hun- 
dred, he  is  valued  accordingiy.  There  are  other 
standards  equally  absurd  that  suggest  themselves. 

In  heaven,  worth,  as  to  moral  character,  and  not 
wealth  as  to  possessions,  measures  the  place  one  is 
to  hold  in  any  and  every  department  of  life,  and 
the  day  is  coming  when  this  will  be  the  human 
standard  as  well.  And  this  standard  of  worth 
versus  wealth  will  be  carried,  with  approving  glad- 
ness, into  every  human  relationship.  This  surely  is 
God's  standard,  and  why  should  it  not  be  ours  ? 
Who  is  most  likely  to  be  mistaken,  God  or  man  ? 
As  the  kingdom  advances,  the  world  will  approach 
the  heavenly  standard  of  estimate,  and  what  a 
changed  world  we  shall  have  when  that  standard 
is  universally  adopted ! 

It  does  not  follow  that  when  the  standard  of 
estimate  on  earth  and  in  heaven  are  one,  that  all 
social  distinctions,  personal  preferences  and  natural 
affinities  will  cease  to  exist.  •  We  may  love  truly, 
as  God  loves,' persons  whom  we  would  not  care  to 
select  as  our  most  intimate  and  lifelong*  associates. 
There,  as  here,  "birds  of  a  feather  flock  together," 
so  that  beings  who  are  similar  in  temperament,  in 
talent,  in  taste  and  in  occupation  will  be  more  to 
each  other  than  they  could  be  if  they  were  oppo- 


ON  EARTH  AS  IT  IS  IN  HE  A  VEN.  205 

sites  in  all  these  respects.  Occupations,  and  train- 
ing for  special  occupations,  and  natural  adaptations 
differ  in  heaven  as  they  do,  and  ever  must  on  earth. 
Some  are  born  poets,  while  others  are  didactic  and 
prosaic  in  their  nature ;  some  are  lovers  of  philos- 
ophy ;  some  find  truth  and  God  through  the  intel- 
lect, and  others  through  the  sensibility  or  the 
imagination.  \  Some  are  social  and  communicative, 
while  others  are  silent  and  reflective ;  some  study 
theology  and  others  natural  science ;  some  are 
practical,  and  others  theoretic ;  but  all,  in  degrees, 
live  spiritual  lives.  So  it  is  on  earth,  and  so  it  will 
be  in  heaven.  As  a  result,  persons  and  spirits  of 
like  sympathies  will  be  drawn  together  and  form 
circles  and  classes  in  part,  by  themselves.  Not 
selfishness,  but  intuition  and  afiinity  lead  to  this, 
and  so  prepare  the  way  for  every  line  of  useful 
and  holy  work  to  be  better  done  both  on  earth  and 
in  heaven. 

Progression,  onward  and  ever  onward,  must  then 
be  the  motto  and  experience  of  the  heavenly  life, 
and  of  life  in  the/perfected  gospel  of  the  kingdom 
on  earth.  Ignorance  necessitates  progress.  The 
spirit  of  man  is  an  emanation  from  God.  It  has 
something  of  divinity  in  it.  It  bears  the  divine 
impress   and  is   susceptible   of    divine  inspiration. 


206  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

It  is  endowed  with  a  longing  desire  for  knowledge. 
Even  in  this  materialistic  and  selfish  age,  the  world 
is  ever  making  new  discoveries ;  and  when  it  shall 
have  advanced  into  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom,  this 
thirst  for  knowledge,  and  success  in  finding  it,  will 
be  far  greater  than  ever  before.  And  in  the  glori- 
fied heaven,  where  spirit  vision  is  substituted  for 
physical,  and  the  powers  of  the  soul  are  greatly 
intensified  and  enlarged,  knowledge  will  be  at- 
tained more  easily  and  rapidly  than  is  possible  to 
man  in  his  earthly  habitation. 

And  what  infinite  fields  for  investigation  are 
open  in  all  directions !  The  w^orld  has  already 
learned  much,  and  yet  we  can  go  but  a  step  any- 
where without  finding  ourselves  in  the  presence  of 
unanswerable  questions.  If  we  ask  what  is  light  ? 
What  is  heat  ?  What  is  electricity  ?  What  is 
gravitation  ?  What  is  matter  ?  What  is  spirit  ? 
What  is  life  ?  What  is  death  ?  and  a  thousand 
other  such  questions,  no  man  living  can  answer 
them.  The  field  for  study  is  as  infinite  as  God, 
and  space,  and  duration  are  infinite.  The  further 
one  advances,  the  wider  is  the  unexplored  field, 
and  the  more  one  has  to  learn. 

When  the  mountain  climber  is  ascending  some 
height,  he  sees  nothing  beyond ;  but  on  reaching 


ON  EARTH  AS  IT  IS  IN  HEA  VEN.  207 

the  summit,  he  discovers  in  the  blue  distance,  and 
in  all  directions,  other  summits  higher  than  his 
own,  to  be  explored.  Peaks  on  peaks  and  Alps 
on  Alps  arise.  So  it  must  ever  be  on  earth  and  in 
heaven.  Let  men  and  angels  progress  in  knowl- 
edge, physical,  ethical,  theological  and  spiritual, 
as  they  may,  and  let  their  longings  for  truth,  and 
their  inspirations  and  successes  be  what  they  maj^, 
still,  their  advances  will  be  as  nothing  compared 
with  the  infinities  that  lie  beyond.  Onward  progress 
will  be  forever  the  law  and  experience  of  all  dwellers 
in  the  kingdom,  whether  on  earth  or  beyond. 

An  experience  such  as  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom 
ensures  must  be  one  of  satisfaction  and  of  great 
blessedness,  because  it  is  one  of  conformity  with 
the  will  of  God,  and  so,  of  moral  perfection.  Ideal 
perfection  belongs  only  to  God.  Finite  beings  are 
perfect  when  they  obey  the  call  of  duty  and  privi- 
lege and  have  their  life  hid  with  Christ  in  God. 
This  state  on  earth  and  in  heaven  is  one  of  bless- 
edness. Some  appear  to  think  that  blessedness  and 
sorrow,  pleasure  and  grief,  are  incompatible,  and 
cannot  dwell  together  in  the  same  life.  It  is  not 
so  with  God  who  grieves  over  the  sins  of  men,  nor 
with  Jesus,  who  was  touched  with  the  feeling  of 
our  infirmities,  who  bore  our  sicknesses,  and  who 


208  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

died  for  us  that  we  might  live.  A  mother's  suffer- 
ing for  a  child,  a  wife's  sympathy  with  a  pain- 
stricken  husband,  a  daughter's  anguish  at  the  bed- 
side of  a  dying  father,  are  all  painful;  but  they 
would  not,  through  absence  or  ignorance,  have  it 
otherwise.  There  is  often  happiness  in  suffering 
that  brings  deep  peace  of  soul  which  the  world  can 
neither  give  nor  take  away.  If  this  be  so  on  earth, 
how  much  more  in  heaven.  To  live  fully  in  the 
gospel  of  the  kingdom  is  highest  blessedness,  and 
this,  regardless  of  environment. 

It  is  the  hope  and  belief  of  the  Christian  world, 
that  when  spirits  from  the  earthly  kingdom  pass 
over  into  the  heavenly,  that  they  will  meet,  recog- 
nize, and  in  proportion  as  character  and  condition 
permit,  associate  with  the  spirits  of  loved  ones  who 
shall  have  gone  on  before.  Spiritual  communion 
in  Christ's  earthly  kingdom  will,  in  that  day,  be 
intimate  and  precious,  and  how  much  more  so  will 
it  be  in  heaven.  This  thought  and  anticipation  has 
comforted  millions  of  weary  souls  as  they  journeyed 
through  their  V  earthly  pilgrimage  to  the  home  of 
the  blessed.  "We  shall  meet  in  heaven,"  are  the 
words  spoken  on  dying  beds,  and  what  would  life 
be  without  such  anticipation ;  or  heaven  itself,  with- 
out its  realization ! 


ON  EARTH  AS  IT  IS  IN  HEA  VEN  209 

I  cannot  and  would  not  avoid  the  belief  that 
when  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom  is  established  on 
earth  as  it  is  in  heaven,  that  a  closer  and  more 
conscious  relationship  will  be  established  between 
dwellers  in  the  two  worlds  than  has  ever  yet  ex- 
isted. Even  now,  it  is  said,  that  the  angels  and 
redeemed  ones  encamp  around  us  and  help  to  shape 
our  thoughts,  lives  and  destinies.  What  we  accept 
on  faith,  now,  may  have  demonstrative  certainty 
then.  It  is  undeniable  that  the  signs  of  the  times 
look  in  that  direction.  But  what,  and  how,  all 
this  that  has  the  support  of  probability  is  to  be  in 
experience,  only  the  future  can  fully  disclose.  If 
it  be  God's  will  that  earth  and  heaven  shall  meet 
together  in  conscious  fellowship,  it  will  come  to 
pass. 

The  points  of  resemblance  and  of  separation  be- 
tween earth  and  heaven  as  they  will  appear  when 
the  gospel  of  the  kingdom  is  fully  established,  have 
now  passed  in  review.  That  Christ's  kingdom  will 
some  day  come  on  earth  as  it  is  in  heaven,  is  the 
burden  of  this  book,  and  has  been  the  inspiration 
and  hope  of  the  ages.  That  it  will  come,  and  how 
it  will  come,  I,  for  one,  have  not  a  shadow  of  doubt. 
But  what  mighty  overturnings  and  changes  in  all 
directions  must  take  place  as  the  inhabitants  of 


210  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM, 

earth,  churches,  religions,  men  of  business,  and 
nations  break  from  their  old  moorings,  and  sail  over 
boisterous  seas,  into  the  harbor  of  the  gospel  king- 
dom !  Such  a  glorious  ending  is  worthy  of  all  the 
toil,  suffering,  struggle  and  death  that  have  been 
experienced  through  all  the  centuries  of  that  slow, 
upward  movement,  that  God  alone  could  compre- 
hend and  control.  He  saw  the  end  from  the  be- 
ginning and  willed  it.  What  may  lie  beyond  our 
open  vision,  God  and  heaven  only  can  reveal. 


XII. 

SUMMAEY  AND  CONCLCJSIOK 


?^ 


XII. 

SUMMARY  AND  CONCLUSION. 

One  great  practical  purpose  for  w^ich  this  book 
is  written,  and  that  has  ever  been  kept  in  view,  is, 
the  enlargement  of  the  ideal  of  religion  ;  and  such 
an  enlargement  as  shall  make  it  to  include  the 
whole,  and  not  a  part  only  of  human  activity  and 
life.  One  of  the  greatest  mistakes  ever  made  by 
man  consists  in  dividing  human  life  into  two  great 
sections,  one  of  which  is  called  religious,  and  the 
other  secular,  and  apart  from  religion.  Attending 
and  supporting  the  Church,  giving  to  religious  in- 
stitutions, reading  the  Bible,  prayer,  outward 
observances  and  a  few  other  such  things  are  often 
thought  to  constitute  the  whole  of  religion  ;  and  it 
is  assumed  that  secular  life, — which  is  made  to  in- 
clude business  of  all  kinds,  politics,  recreation  and 
the  whole  round  of  sports  and  pleasures, — lies 
wholly  outside  of  religion.  This  view  shuts  off 
from  religious  responsibility,  privilege  and  duty, 
the  greater  part  of  human  life.  A  more  monstrous 
and  fatal  heresy  never  possessed  the  minds  and 
hearts  of  men !     If,  by  any  manipulation,  such  a 

213 


214  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

view  can  seem  to  harmonize  with  the  gospel  of  the 
Church,  it  surely  is  in  direct  contradiction  of  the 
gospel  of  the  kingdom  which  demands  that  whether 
we  eat  or  drink  or  whatsoever  we  do,  all  must  be 
done  to  the  glory  of  God.  While  I  would  not 
claim  that  one  day,  or  one  class  of  actions  can  be 
no  more  sacred  than  another,  it  must  yet  be  in- 
sisted upon  that  every  day  and  every  act  of  life  does 
something  to  make  and  mould  moral  character,  and 
should  be  regarded  as  religious,  and  should  be  regu- 
lated by  religious  principle.  Man's  whole  life,  and  in 
one  department  equally  with  another,  should  be  in 
perfect  conformity  with  the  law  of  love,  supreme 
towards  God  and  impartial  towards  man.  This  is 
the  law  of  the  kingdom,  and  is  the  central  law  of 
the  moral  universe.  It  is  that  on  which  all  just 
law  and  good  government  is  suspended.  Love  is 
the  fulfilling  of  the  law,  so  that  whatever  is  apart 
from  love  is  apart  from  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom. 
This  then,  is  the  conception  of  religion  that 
underlies  all  of  the  preceding  chapters,  and  which  I 
would,  in  these  concluding  words,  emphasize  as 
fundamental  principles  of  the  gospel  of  the  king- 
dom. If  the  true  idea  of  religion  does  not  embrace 
and  control  the  entire  life  of  man,  then,  it  is  a 
house  divided  against  itself  and  cannot  stand. 


SUMMARY  AND  CONCLUSION.  215 

The  central  purpose  of  the  whole  book,  I  repeat, 
is  to  show  that  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom,  which 
reaches  and  controls  the  whole  of  human  life,  is 
some  day,  to  come  on  earth  as  it  is  in  heaven,  and 
to  note  the  steps  by  which  it  is  to  be  accomplished. 
The  proof  of  all  this  may  be  further  unified  and 
accentuated  by  a  brief  summary  of  the  chapters 
that  lead  up  to,  and  assure,  so  great  and  glorious  a 
consummation. 

We  have  seen  that  the  idea  of  a  kingdom,  in 
which  God  is  sovereign,  and- man  subject,  is  as  old 
as  the  human  race.  It  was  cherished  by  the  oldest 
nations,  and  is  fundamental  in  the  Old  Testament 
Scriptures.  This  doctrine  of  the  kingdom  was  the 
great  theme  of  our  Lord's  preaching  ;  and  the  prin- 
ciples He  taught  were  so  broad  as  to  include  in  that 
gospel  every  agency  and  instrumentality,  that 
works,  or  should  work,  towards  the  elevation  and 
spiritual  life  of  the  world. 

We  have  seen  that,  and  how,  this  great  concep- 
tion of  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom  came  to  be  set 
aside  or  narrowed  down  to  the  smaller  conception 
of  the  gospel  of  the  Church  ;  all  because  the  apostles 
and  their  associates  were  not  able  fully  to  compre- 
hend their  Master's  meaning  when  He  spoke  so  con- 
stantly of  the  kingdom.     We  have  traced  the  ad- 


216  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM, 

vantages  and  disadvantages  of  this  transfer;  its 
advantages  being  that  the  world  was  not  then  pre- 
pared to  apprehend  more  than  was  contained  in  the 
gospel  of  the  Church ;  and  that  the  preaching  of 
that  gospel,  from  apostolic  times  till  now,  has  re- 
sulted in  incalculable  blessings  to  mankind ;  while 
at  the  same  time,  the  transfer  has  led  to  vast  evils. 
It  laid  the  foundation  for  a  narrow,  rigid  ecclesias- 
ticism  that  darkened  the  early  centuries ;  and  it 
formed  narrow  creeds  that  were  divisive  in  tend- 
ency, and  that  in  the  end,  split  the  Church,  that 
should  always  have  been  one,  into  a  thousand  rival 
and  contending  fragments. 

"We  have  further  seen  that  the  time  must  come 
when  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom  will  be  restored 
to  its  rightful  place  as  Jesus  conceived  it.  Then, 
will  the  Church,  in  all  its  branches,  the  wealth  and 
good  influences  of  the  world,  and  the  nations  of 
the  earth,  all  flow  into  the  kingdom,  and  establish 
it  on  earth  as  it  is  in  heaven.  Reasons  were  given 
for  this  expectation.  This  great  change,  it  was 
seen,  is  not  to  be  brought  about  suddenly,  or  by 
violence,  but  is  to  be  a  growth,  by  creative 
energy,  under  the  operation  of  God's  central  law  of 
evolution  that  works  silently,  but  never  fails  to 
reach  its  end. 


SUM3IARY  AND  CONCLUSION.  217 

Then,  Ave  considered  the  great  struggle  and  crisis 
that  is  coming  upon  the  twentieth  century  ;  and  the 
crucial  questions,  full  of  portent,  that  the  growth 
of  the  world  is  bringing  to  our  doors,  and  that 
must  be  settled,  and  settled  rightly,  if  this  century 
is  to  lead  on  into  the  kingdom.  The  place  and  im- 
portance that  the  growing  view  of  Divine  imma- 
nence, and  of  God-consciousness  was  to  hold  in  the 
great  movement  heavenward,  was  next  considered. 
The  religious  and  benevolent  enterprises  of  the 
world,  emanating  largely  from  the  Church,  such  as 
the  Church  itself,  eleemosynary  institutions,  Chris- 
tian missions.  Home  and  Foreign,  Sunday-Schools, 
and  Young  People's  Societies  for  Christian  w^ork 
were  studied  as  augmenting  the  flow- tide  that 
sweeps  into  the  kingdom.  To  the  same  end,  other 
agencies,  almost  wholly  outside  of  the  Church,  such 
as  schools,  art,  invention,  literature,  and  the  growth 
of  natural  science,  were  considered  and  found  to 
belong  largely  to  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom. 

The  various  religions  of  the  world  came  under 
review ;  and  it  was  seen  that,  while  all  of  them  con- 
tained much  that  was  temporary,  still,  they  all 
embodied  the  great  principles  of  the  universal  re- 
ligion ;  and  that  the  gospel  of  the  kingdom,  with 
Christ  made  prominent,  is  to  be  established  in  all 


218  THE  GOSPEL  OF  THE  KINGDOM. 

the  earth.  Then  comes  the  closing  chapter  de- 
scriptive of  the  kingdom  on  earth  as  it  is  in  heaven. 
Surely,  the  theme  is  an  inspiring  one,  and,  if  its 
treatment,  owing  in  part,  at  least,  to  the  wear  and 
weight  of  many  gladsome  years,  is  not  equal  to  the 
demand,  it  may,  perchance,  open  windows  through 
which  other  minds  may  discover  truths  that  the 
writer's  dimness  of  vision  did  not  enable  him  to  see, 
except  in  golden  vision. 


Date  Due 


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